Smoke gets in your eyes
by Eliot Rosewater
Summary: A spider and a ghost go on a mission. It sounds like the beginning to a bad joke.
1. Chapter 1

Men enter the Red Room with a coffin-sized metal box. There are tanks and sensors attached to the box; their screens are frosted over. Natalia watches from the third floor landing. Ivan Petrovitch Bezukhov — male, white, aged forty-seven years — meets the men and their box. They shake hands and hug like old friends. Bezukhov slaps his hand on the box twice. He seems proud of it. Natalia's fingers toy with the wire of her bracelet garrote. Bezukhov waves a hand and they move down a corridor.

The Soldier is back.

She turns away from the landing and goes to the studio. That's where they find her several hours later. Her hair is damp and sticking to her face. Sweat stains her shirt, and inside her pointe shoes, her toes are bleeding. Bezukhov and one of the new men wait for her to finish her movement. The Soldier stands docile behind the two of them. His eyes don't track her. The two men clap when she's finished.

"This is our newest one," Bezukhov says to the man. "Natalia, meet Vasily Petrenko. Mr. Petrenko, the Black Widow."

She shakes his hand, bows a little. "Sir," she says. They haven't acknowledged the Soldier's presence behind them.

Bezukhov holds a dossier out to her. "We have a mission for you."

Natalia accepts it but doesn't open it. She looks at Bezukhov and says, "I don't need a babysitter."

Petrenko laughs and says, "Yes, but sometimes the Asset does."

"I'm not a babysitter."

Bezukhov's face goes stony and he stares hard at her. But Petrenko laughs again and says, "It is good the Asset isn't a baby then! _Soldat_ , come say hello to the Black Widow!"

The Soldier's eyes come back on-line and he steps forward though he still isn't in front of the two men. She stares at him and he stares at her knees.

They've met before: She remembers his metal arm around her neck when she was thirteen. She remembers tapping on that arm when she couldn't escape and him letting her go. She remembers watching all the other girls do the same thing; none of them could escape his hold. She remembers once he smiled when Dasha did a stupid little squirm when it was her turn to escape — they had all laughed, even him. She remembers his handlers disciplining him for it: for smiling and laughing. They put him in a chair and made all the girls watch him forget.

He doesn't remember.

She says to the Soldier, "My name is Natalia."

He glances up to a spot over her right shoulder. That's how he demonstrates his understanding. She knows this. She knows that some call the Soldier a ghost, but she knows that there's not enough humanity left in his body even for that.

Petrenko is genial — male, white, aged sixty-one years. His face is long and narrow. His eyes are deep-set and near-perfect circles. His nose is thin and prominent, an inverse of his eyes. There's dark grey hair, receding on the sides, flat against his head. Natalia guesses that he is almost two meters tall. He is quick to smile.

Bezukhov says, "Mr. Petrenko is going to run you through the Asset's protocols. Then you will take him on the mission."

Natalia looks at her handler but doesn't say anything.

Petrenko claps and says, "Let us begin!" He puts a hand on the Soldier's head, ruffles the dark, damp hair. "He gets antsy when he has nothing to do."

Natalia doubts it. But she says "lead the way" anyway.

She follows him down to the basement. They walk by the room where the Soldier's equipment has been setup; the opened metal box and the chair are prominent among the supplies. Natalia doesn't look at it and neither does the Soldier. Petrenko leads the way, Natalia follows, and the Soldier tails them both. They enter a room two doors down from the metal box.

She's been here before. Everyone has been in this room before. Retraining. Conditioning. Correction.

Petrenko says, "He is good — an excellent listener. _Soldat_ , come here, won't you?"

The Soldier goes to stand beside the man. He looks at Petrenko's knees while the man pats the side of the Soldier's face. Natalia sees that Petrenko is fond of the Soldier the same way sentimental men are fond of dogs.

"He feeds and waters himself as needed but will wait for the order," Petrenko says. He's still stroking the Soldier's cheek. "He can take care of most injuries, both his own and any that his team may incur. If he requires assistance tending to his own injuries, he will let you know. Do not worry about rest; he requires little and prefers to keep watch." Petrenko smiles at Natalia. "It is a habit of his since most of his missions are unaccompanied. We did not find this behavior adverse."

She watches the muscles in the Soldier's back tense as Petrenko's hand settles on the Soldier's neck.

"But sometimes he needs correcting," Petrenko says. "Different behaviors call for different methods of correction."

This, she knows.

Petrenko goes through all kinds of misbehavior the Asset might exhibit. The longer the mission takes, the higher the chances that the Soldier will act undesirably. Natalia learns when she must deny the Soldier food, water, and rest. Petrenko says that cattle prods are effective tools for correcting small acts of disobedience. For example, if the Soldier looks her directly in the eye without being directed thus. He tells her to take the prod and shock the Soldier in the neck, between the legs, and under the ribs. She does, and the Soldier doesn't make a sound; he begins to sweat.

To disable the Soldier's prosthetic arm, Petrenko tells her to use EMPs. He knows that she is already equipped with similar devices. He instructs her to throw one of the devices at the arm, and she does. Sparks jump off the metal and a mechanical, grinding sound scratches at all their ears. It only works for a short while. Sometimes, Petrenko says, the Soldier will remove the EMP device without being instructed to do so. In that case, more extreme forms of correction are required. Petrenko has Natalia whip the Soldier's natural hand with a plastic sjambok — just so she knows the force required to properly discipline him.

It takes two hours for Petrenko to tell Natalia how to correct all the ways the Soldier may act out. He has her strike the Soldier, slash him, suffocate him, and disable every part of him. Natalia does it all without hesitance. The Soldier doesn't hesitate either, but his breathing gets heavy and he continues to sweat.

Petrenko gives her a list of ten words which will recalibrate the Soldier. He gives her a single word which will, he says, work like an emergency shutdown. So far, they've never needed to use the emergency shutdown. Natalia pretends to be impressed. There are more words which will manipulate the Soldier's behavior. Petrenko writes them down because he can't remember them all and what order they must be said in.

When all of this is over, Natalia asks her first question: "Does he spar?"

She knows the answer. She knows.

"It is not wise to injure yourself before a mission."

"Does he spar?" she repeats.

"Of course."

"I like to know how good my partners are."

"The Soldier is very good, I can assure you."

Petrenko does not know how Natalia first met the Soldier. Stupid mistake.

Natalia still hasn't looked at Petrenko. She's had her eyes on the Soldier the whole time. "Leave us," she says to Petrenko. She has no interest in whether or not the Soldier will obey her. She wants to know if Petrenko will.

He is nervous and stutters, but he does leave. The door closes behind him. Natalia relaxes her posture and doesn't smile at the Soldier. He is still kneeling in the center of the room, sweating and slowly regaining control of his breathing.

"You can stand," she says.

He does.

"Sorry about all that," she continues casually. Shrugs. "Have to keep up appearances."

Nothing. But that's what she had expected.

"Let's spar. First to draw blood wins." He blinks at her pointe shoes — she's still wearing them. Blood has stained the satin. She looks at the marks and slashes she'd given him under Petrenko's instruction. "First to draw _fresh_ blood."

Whatever Bezukhov's asking her to do — it is the perfect opportunity to make that change she's been thinking of making. Especially if they give her the Soldier, too. Anything can be accomplished if one has the right tools. The Soldier is the ultimate multi-tool, if she can win his allegiance.

She has to _know_.

Natalia turns out and raises her arms, rolls onto the bloody boxes hidden in the toes of her shoes. She watches and waits to see how he will respond.

 _One, two, three, four, five, six_.

Slowly — so slowly she would not have noticed if she weren't trying so hard to see it — the Soldier shifts his weight onto the balls of his feet. His heels rise off the ground by mere millimeters. His body remembers what they made his mind forget.

It's a start.


	2. Chapter 2

Bezukhov gives Natalia a new name: Klara Igorevna Alexandrova.

The identity snaps on, interchangeable. She is a drill and Klara is the bit she has been fitted with today. Klara is ambitious. She is a chatterbox who gets loose lips when she drinks (wine — make it red). She laughs easy and, when she's in a new place, tries a little too hard to fit in and make friends. Klara is loud and friendly, but she's also insecure. It makes others around her roll their eyes but also feel a little bit bad for her.

Someone is stealing secrets from the clients of the Red Room. Klara is going to find the leak. She's going to find out who's buying. She's going to talk to them.

Natalia doesn't see where the Soldier comes into all of this, but Bezukhov assures her that the Soldier has a slightly different mission. He will protect Klara and ensure that her cover is not threatened. The Soldier will be more useful once they find out who the buyer is; that's where he'll take the lead.

The Soldier doesn't get a new name or identity for the mission. He doesn't get one for _any_ mission. Natalia wonders what that's like. If she is a pistol-grip drill that can fit any number of drill bits, what is he? A firing pin? The Soldier is a tool, she reminds herself. That's what she needs him to be. Anything else, well . . . they'll get to that later.

Briefed, disguised, and armed, Natalia and the Soldier are released the next day. It's a good thing the weather is turning cold, because there is no other way they could get away with the Soldier wearing such bulky clothes. His arm is the least of their worries. It's hiding all the weapons beneath normal-looking clothes that's the tricky part.

She thinks they give him too many weapons. If he's so great, why do they weigh him down like that?

Natalia doesn't care what the answer is. Not really.

A spiderling leaves with them. She is so small; Natalia knows the girl cannot spin her own webs yet. But she is learning, and escorting (more accurately, tailing) Natalia and the Soldier to their jump-off point is all part of it.

It appears no one explained this to the Soldier. He keeps looking behind them at the girl. It's funny. The girl's confidence in her ability to blend in with a crowd must be crippling to dust every time the Soldier's gaze finds her with ease.

Natalia brushes the back of her hand against the Soldier's right forearm. "It's fine."

That seems to pacify him. He stops looking for the girl, but Natalia sees his head twitch, like he wants to have eyes on their tail every other minute. They told her the Soldier doesn't have opinions and should not be offered choices beyond which rifle he would like to use for a particular mission. (That is not a choice, though. That's a test.)

So the first thing she does once she successfully loses their tail is go to a coffee shop near the train station. Outside the door she says, "Do you want anything?"

He blinks at her. She smiles Klara's smile and a wrinkle appears between his brows. Internally, Natalia flinches. Switching back to Natalia, she says, "I'll pick something for both of us. But next time, it's your turn to pick, OK?"

The Soldier's jaw opens a few degrees, not enough to make his lips part. He wants to say that he understands, but he's not supposed to lie.

"Come on," she says and makes a point for the words to be light.

She gets them both hot chocolate. Natalia isn't a fan of coffee (but Klara is — she loves the stuff, can't start the day without a cup or two of the hot stuff). She figures it's the safest bet for the Soldier. The caffeine would be wasted on his metabolism anyway. Natalia might as well get him something that tastes good.

She hands one of the cups off to him. He holds it in his left. Doesn't drink it. She buys them train tickets for Saint Petersburg. The sign in the station still says Leningrad. As she completes the transaction, Natalia can see the Soldier blinking at the name out of the corner of her eye.

On the train, Natalia pulls Klara back into place and talks loudly and insignificantly to the Soldier. She says crass and bawdy things so that no one attempts to sit in the compartment with them. The character is exhausting because she is so unlike Natalia's natural state. Once the wheels begin to move beneath them, she drops Klara. The Soldier looks as close to relieved as he is capable of looking.

"Try it," she says of the hot chocolate he's still gripping in his left hand.

It's the right phrasing. The Soldier brings it to his lips and drinks. He doesn't swallow though. As soon as he tastes it, his eyebrows jump up his forehead and he spits it back into the cup. Natalia's lips curl at the corners.

"It's good, right?"

As usual, he doesn't say anything. Natalia assumes that he agrees with her when he shifts the cup to his right hand. He takes a small sip, lets it sit on his tongue, and then swallows it.

They told her the Soldier doesn't have conversations. It's too soon to start a proper one, so she pulls out Klara again and starts practicing incessant talking. She tells him stories from Klara's life, what she's seen and done. Klara is a sucker for gossip and she shares all the juicy details of other people's lives with the Soldier. What can she say — Klara just can't keep a secret!

They're sitting side by side on molded plastic seats. Across from them are short berths. Klara talks with her hands. She touches the Soldier's arm and knee to emphasize sincerity or humor. Even if the entire world asked her not to touch them, Klara wouldn't listen. She'd say she was sorry and bluster about being more respectful. But she was the type of woman who never followed through; not on picking up the dry cleaning when she said she would and certainly not on her diet! She doesn't do it to upset anyone. It's just the way Klara is — take it or leave it.

It's easy to see that all the talking confuses the Soldier at first. It amuses Natalia to see the line between his brows. He eventually figures out that none of what Klara says is mission-critical, and so he stops paying so much attention. She keeps up the storm of words and the Soldier looks out the window while taking tiny sips of cold hot chocolate.

But even Natalia gets tired of Klara before long. The talking ends but the noise does not. Natalia fishes an mp3 player from one of Klara's bags. It's not the latest model, but it's a good knock-off approximation of one: a parallel to Klara herself. There's a small speaker in the bag, too. The kind that people used to connect to their desktop computers. (Klara cares very little about what those around her think as long as she is enjoying herself. It's just a bit of music — who cares if not everyone likes it?)

It's Natalia, not Klara, who says, "I did a mission in the US when I was very young. An old man took me in for a few days." He would have adopted her if she hadn't killed him. Sometimes Natalia still thinks about what that would have been like. "He played a lot of old records. I sort of liked the songs."

She sets the speaker's volume low and hits play on the mp3 player. Then she lies down on the bottom berth, across from the Soldier. Sam Cooke croons her to sleep.

The Soldier wakes her up when the trains arrives at its destination: "Natalia."

The compartment is quiet. Natalia check the mp3 player. The Soldier turned off the music during "I'll See You in My Dreams."

It's progress.

(It's easier than she thought.)

She puts everything back in the bag and leads the Soldier out onto the platform. She's Klara again, suddenly, talking to him loudly and animatedly. She buys them tickets for their next train. They have an hour to wait. The Soldier holds out his cup to her, won't meet her eyes.

"Want more?" she asks. She knows, but she wants to hear him say it.

He looks up at her hair and then down at her boots. Close enough.

They go to a shop that's inside the station. It's grimy — just the way she likes it. Natalia asks the Soldier what he would like to try this time. She'd told him he would have pick for himself the second time. He just holds the cup out toward her again. Klara, bold and brassy, goes and orders two more (plain and boring) hot chocolates.

The Soldier accepts the new cup with his right hand. The old one is in his left and it looks like he has no plans to throw it away. He starts sipping from it immediately. Natalia sardonically wonders if he likes it better cold. She sits them down at a table near the wall where they'll have a good view of the shop. Klara tells the Soldier about a neighbor she once had. The entire building called her the town's mattress. The girl had been with _everybody_! Do you believe it? She was such a pretty girl; it was a shame that she was such a whore —

"Natalia," the Soldier interrupts.

The talking ceases immediately and Klara slides off of Natalia's face.

"Natalia," he says again and inclines his head toward her. He brings the cup to his lips to hide their upward bend.

He knows the difference.

"Then what should I call you?" she asks.

Behind the cup, his lips return to their neutral state. The Soldier puts the cup down and looks chastised.

"I'm not going to call you _Soldat_ all the time."

"Asset," he says.

Natalia rolls her eyes. "That's worse."

He shrugs.

"Just pick one. It's critical you have a normal-sounding name for this mission."

Another shrug.

"Nikita?"

The Soldier pulls a face.

"Andrei?"

Shake of the head.

"Artem?"

Another shake.

"Kostya?"

No.

"Boris."

The Soldier drinks from his cup and doesn't dignify the suggestion with a response.

Natalia smiles in place of her laughter. "OK, I see your point. Jakub?"

He lowers his cup. Natalia watches his cheeks move, swishing the drink around his mouth. "Yakov," he says.

"Yakov it is." Natalia mirrors Yakov and drinks some hot chocolate.

* * *

 **Note:**

 **I felt one hundred years old typing the words 'mp3 player.'**


	3. Chapter 3

How do you gain the loyalty and affections of a dog?

Step 1: Offer it a treat.

Mission accomplished: hot chocolate offered and accepted.

Step 2: Let it sniff your ass.

Done (figuratively).

Step 3: Give it a name it responds to.

She did better than that — she got him to name himself.

Step 4: Keep it occupied.

The Soldier gives Natalia nothing to work with until she says that they should get snacks for the train ride to Cologne. He has no opinion, of course, so she grabs junk off of all the shelves in another shop inside the train station. Then they board the train — Klara secures them privacy once more — and she holds the bag of snacks out to him with the order to "pick something that looks good."

The Soldier blinks at her for a second and then takes the bag. He ends up pulling out peanuts in the shell. It's another three minutes and forty-one seconds before he opens the packet. Klara smacks bubble gum loudly and watches him out of the corner of her eye. He pinches the shells until they crack with his metal hand. The peanuts fall into his right and he puts them back in the bag. He collects the cracked shells on the table top. Never does he eat one of the peanuts, just releases them from their shells.

He catches her watching him. "Like little skulls," he whispers.

Klara suddenly feels like she weighs five hundred kilos. Natalia can't hold on to her anymore and the identity falls away. Words dry up on her tongue. The Soldier cracks another shell and Natalia just barely holds back a shudder. She can feel it under her hands: _crack_ and gruesome satisfaction.

 _Endure_ , she tells herself. _It's almost over._

Step 5: Give it a comfortable place to stay.

When they arrive in Cologne, Natalia says, "What do you think? Want to slum it or splurge?"

The Soldier says nothing. Surveys their surroundings, assessing. Natalia's already done it. There're no threats. He only does it now because he doesn't want to look at her. He hadn't liked listening to Vic Damone for the last twenty minutes of the train ride. The Soldier's mad at her for it but he doesn't know what 'mad' is yet. Doesn't know why.

Well, _something_ had to be done about the peanut shells. And he had already been carrying her bags for her.

He's used to sleeping in a frozen box or not sleeping at all. Natalia decides to put them up somewhere extravagant. As soon as they enter their room, the Soldier removes his boots. Interesting.

Step 6: Give it a bath and feed it.

Natalia deviates here. She points the bathroom and says, "Why don't you clean up? Take as long as you need."

He leaves his boots by the door, drops the bags on the round table, and walks sock-footed into the bathroom. She hears water falling. The light never gets turned on and the door never closes. Natalia sighs. Toeing off her own boots, she flops onto the bed face-first. In the privacy afforded her by her hair and the comforter, Natalia lets an unsteady breath fall out. She tries to be still but her hands tremble just once. Klara reaches a stone hand out but Natalia slaps it away.

If this is what it costs, she has to pay it. She reminds herself that she wants it.

So that's all the time she spends pulling at her own seams. She pushes herself up in one piece. Changes clothes. Sits on the couch and turns on the television. Finds a program that is inane but not without entertainment value. Natalia settles into the space between the back of the couch and the armrest and examines her feet.

She is a lot of people at once. But her feet give her away. They are Natalia's. They are the bones on which everyone else was built. They're dancer's feet: ugliness made by practicing grace.

The light shifts without dimming. She looks up to see the Soldier standing completely nude a few strides behind the couch. One of her eyebrows quirks up and Natalia says without missing a beat, "Mrs. Robinson, you're trying to seduce me."

Humor, for now, is completely wasted on him. Why did she even bother?

He swallows deliberately. It strikes her that he's waiting for something. Her heart jumps and her hollow memory screams.

Natalia says, "Get dressed."

He does and then comes back to stand beside her.

Patting the vacant space beside her on the couch, she says, "You can sit if you like."

After sixteen seconds, he does. There's fifty-two centimeters between her feet and his thigh.

"I haven't properly eaten since we left. What do you have a taste for?"

He shakes his head.

"What is it?"

"I was fed before deployment."

"The thing about eating is that you have to do it several times a day to maintain optimal functioning." The thought finally catches up to her that the Soldier doesn't eat the traditional way. He said he was fed, not that he ate. She says, "Oh. Well, let me know when it wears off, and we can get you something."

"Understood."

She calls for the homiest thing on the room service menu, orders too much of it. Just in case. She eats at the couch. They watch the stupid television program in silence. Natalia leaves the food in the middle of their two bodies and sits back from it to look at her feet again. They're particularly raw and blistered since her visit to the studio the day the Soldier arrived.

Step 7: Scratch it behind the ears. Pet it. Play with it. Have fun together.

Natalia skips this step. She doesn't think either of them is ready for it.

Step 8: Let it help you.

When the program ends, the Soldier says, "Do you require aid?" He's staring at her feet. They're bleeding anew since she's been picking at them.

"If you don't mind," she says.

The Soldier retrieves their shared first aid kit. It is stocked better than anyone's camping supplies, full of the good drugs. When he sits back down, he reaches a hand toward her ankle but then freezes a fourth of the way there. His eyes won't focus. She sees they're directed at her feet, but she knows he's not seeing them. Natalia puts her feet in his lap one at a time. He thaws. The left hand is cool and soothing against the angry skin of her feet. He drains her largest blisters, cleans the toes which have lost their nails. He applies bandages to the places which weep.

Step 9: Make it feel useful. Let it know you appreciate it.

Later, when they're no longer touching, she says, "Are you tired? I can take watch."

He shakes his head.

"You'll sleep tomorrow. I'm not asking."

"Understood."

"I'm meeting Oskar Rainer tomorrow at Haxenhaus. He's a middle man between clients and the Red Room. He thinks I'm looking to put a hit out on somebody." She hands over a piece of paper from the dossier Bezukhov had given her. "I'm going to tell him that I want the hit done at this address. I'm going to plant a bug and follow him after the consultation. We'll see who he hands the information to. Do you want to do some recon tonight?"

He's nodding his head before she even finishes the question.

"Thank you, Yakov."

He's got his boots back on and his weapons strapped in place in a matter of seconds. It happens so fast it leaves Natalia feeling uneasy. But she's alone now and another disconnected breath shakes its way free from her chest. She shoves Klara away again and reaches for the television remote.

Step 10: Wait for it to make the next move.


	4. Chapter 4

She waits forty minutes after the Soldier leaves before she goes to the bathroom. Unlike him, she turns on the light and closes the door. Natalia locks it. Stripping off the bandages that he had just put on her feet, she turns on the shower. The water is punishingly cold for seven minutes before she swings the dial to the other extreme. The hot water burns and thaws her viciously.

Steam covers the mirror when she steps out of the shower. She likes it that way: when she can only see her indistinct boundaries. If she were a doll, she would be the stuffing that is packed inside an infinite number of cloth-bodies. The Soldier is almost the opposite, she thinks: the same cloth-body but never allowed to have stuffing. Which is worse? Natalia doesn't know; they sound like the same fate to her: the drill and the firing pin.

The straw girl and the wind-up toy.

The spider and the ghost.

She leaves the bathroom steamy. Klara sleeps in satin slips. They're cool against her skin. She burrows under the comforter and falls asleep.

In the morning, she finds the Soldier sitting on the couch. He turns to face her when she gets up out of the bed.

"Hello," she says.

"Good morning," he says. He's unsure.

Because Klara starts the day with coffee, so too does Natalia. They are the same person. Natalia is the stuffing and Klara is the cloth-body. Before the tiny coffeemaker, she arches her back and stretches her arms above her head. Bones make snapping sounds. It's OK; they're hers.

"Want some?" Klara says.

The Soldier looks up when he hears the change in her tone. His brows draw down like he's disappointed. Shakes his head. Lips trace the word 'no' but he doesn't speak.

"Another time then," she says. "First time I had it, another person was born. But black coffee is for masochists."

"And poor people," the Soldier surprises her by saying.

Klara spits out a laugh. "I've had my fair share of shit coffee before I could afford copious amounts of milk and sugar. And lattes! Nearly drank myself out of house and home when I had cappuccino, too. Thank God it was only a phase! No more of that for me. One of these days you're gonna have to let me get you something with hazelnut in it!" She goes on prattling about useless coffee flavors while she orders breakfast. It's like walking for the first time after breaking your femur. It feels good. She keeps it up until there's a hesitant knock on the door.

Klara pulls it open and smiles wide in her satin nightclothes. The Do Not Disturb sign is hanging from the handle. She pulls it off and winks at the attendant. Internally, Natalia thinks about how the sign got there. _She_ hadn't put it out. Had the Soldier? She can't imagine it. There's flirting and a generous tip. The attendant never fully enters the room.

Klara wheels the laden cart to the couch. The Soldier's still sitting there. She sits beside him with an egg and sausage thing.

"Eat something," she says.

He picks the fruit and eats first the cantaloupe and then the honeydew. Ugh, the worst parts of any fruit mixture. He'd probably take his coffee black, too, if he were human enough to drink it.

"More," she says.

The Soldier eats the crust off two pieces of toast. He leaves the rest of it. Strange.

Natalia eats her eggs and sausage, then she eats a whole piece of toast, the good parts of the mixed fruit, two pancakes, bacon, some of the weird cheeses and cuts of meat, and pours herself more coffee — she demonstrates how to have a proper breakfast for him. She sits back in her corner of the couch with a muffin. Angles her body toward the Soldier.

"How'd recon go?"

His throat moves like an engine that just won't turn over. But then it does. "Address was patrolled for four hours with a maximum perimeter of five kilometers."

The Soldier tells her everything about the intended hit location. It's a lot of information for such a small place. Natalia is bored. The place is secure; she'd known that before she selected it. Good to know that the Soldier kept busy for the night. Natalia has a feeling that she is going to run out of things for the Soldier to do at night very soon. Hopefully he'll be up to sleeping.

She nods her head when he finishes his report. His voice had cracked a few times so Natalia nods her head toward the pitcher of water on the cart. He pours himself a glass and drinks it all at once.

"It's OK," she says.

He does it two more times.

"Drink whenever you like. Do whatever you want when you need to."

"Understood."

She smiles and drinks the remains of her coffee. "The Rainer meeting is at noon. I'm going to get ready. Rest or eat some more."

His metal fingers pick at his human nails. "Haxenhaus," he says.

She waits for the rest. After two minutes, there isn't any more. So she says, "What about it?"

"No recon."

Ah. She should have known. "Don't worry about that yet."

He nods his head but keeps picking at his nails.

She leaves him there. Grabbing Klara's bag, Natalia goes to the bathroom and flips on the light. The mirror isn't steamy like last night. She can see herself clearly. No, she can see her body clearly. Not _her_. She's never been able to; there's nothing to see anymore. Turning her attention to the bag, she undoes the zipper. All the components of Klara stare back up at her: makeup, facial prosthetics, wigs, contacts.

It took years to disassemble Natalia Romanova. But it only takes a few hours to reassemble her pieces into something new.

Klara Igorevna Alexandrova has skin a few degrees darker than Natalia. Her eyes are blue, not green. Her eyebrows are thinner, a style leftover from a few years ago. Her nose is wider but her cheeks are sculpted. There's an ever-so-slight cleft in her chin. Klara has short blonde hair — she's just too lazy to style long hair anymore! Not to mention all the freedom she felt cutting all that dreadful hair off. Her head feels so much lighter! She uses so much less shampoo!

Natalia snorts softly to herself. Klara is fun even if she isn't real. So superficial. So vain. Shallow. It's what makes her a believable person. Klara is a character in the lives of others. People are self-centered; it's nothing against them. That's just how people are. They see life from their own eyes. All Natalia has to do is create someone everyone will see as just another supporting character. They don't look any deeper. They don't look for a person when confronted with something like Klara.

Natalia paints her skin and applies plastic-y facial prosthetics. She blends the edges with the rest of her skin. She changes her eyes, her eyelashes, the shape and weight of her brow. Klara likes to suntan; Natalia paints and carves delicate, just-beginning-to-form wrinkles into her false face. A thousand minute changes take place across her body. The Soldier hovers outside the door sometimes. His nervousness makes the air around Natalia-turning-Klara vibrate. It's not natural for him. Not yet, anyway.

She leans away from the mirror and blinks the contacts into place. It's easier to look at herself when she's like this: disguised. It's easier to look at a complete person, even if she's as false as her eyelashes.

"Yakov," she calls.

The Soldier appears in less than a second in the doorway. He won't look directly at her, but he doesn't know where else to rest his eyes. It serves only to make him appear shifty.

"Yakov, is something wrong?"

"You," he says and then lets the word hang.

"Yes?"

"You look like Natalia, but you aren't."

Another glimpse of herself morphed halfway into a complete person. "Does this bother you?"

He shrugs. Shakes his head. "You don't look like Natalia," he says to his boots.

"Hm." She stares at her not-self in the mirror. "And what does Natalia look like?" she asks the reflection. _I really want to know_.

"Sad," the Soldier says. "Brave."

 _Sad. Brave._

It makes her smile wistfully at the reflection. "You can't look brave."

The words make him look down and step back.

"It'll be gone after the meeting," she says and turns back to the mirror. She lets him disappear unobserved.

She's wearing Klara's face and she can turn on the personality whenever she pleases. Natalia used to dream about putting on one of the faces and never taking it off. She would keep the face and name and she would _be_ someone. She would keep the personality and turn her cover into reality. A ready-made life just waiting for her to take up residence.

It doesn't work like that, Natalia knows. She can't make a false name true. Fiction cannot be turned into fact simply because she wants it to. If she wants to stay in a cloth-body, she has to sew herself in and reinforce the seams.

So that's why she's here. The Soldier is going to help sew her in whether he knows it or not. It's almost over, all of this. She's calling the game soon. _Endure just a little while longer._

Natalia leans toward the mirror and starts to apply Klara's makeup; she likes blue eyeshadow.


	5. Chapter 5

Klara looks like a real woman. She emerges fully formed from the bathroom and finds the Soldier peering out the window with his face scrunched up. It makes him look like a duck.

"What do you think, babe?" she says. She kicks one of her legs out so the skirt whirls around her. Strikes a pose.

The Soldier blinks at her, stoic as ever.

Klara flaps a hand and laughs. Breaks from the pose. "I'll give Oskar the ol' razzle dazzle in this, huh?"

Underneath, Natalia sees the Soldier's lips twitch.

"Yes," he says.

When she laughs, it's Natalia.

"You ready to go, Yakov?" Klara holds out her arm to him. Hesitance filling the air in waves. "To run recon on Haxenhaus."

He coughs. "Y-yes. Yes, I'm ready." He fills his hands with his weapons.

Her arm drops. A smile spreads across her face. "Then let's get a move on."

They walk to Haxenhaus. It's a bit of a long walk, but it feels good. The wind cuts through Klara's clothes. Natalia rattles under the false face. The Soldier falls a half step behind her and suddenly the wind diminishes by seventy percent. It's easy to believe he does this because he thinks someone is tailing them.

Two blocks from the restaurant, Klara stops her soliloquy. Natalia rises up and brushes her hand against the Soldier's arm. He looks at her — even his eyes are grey and washed of color.

"Here," she says. She brushes back his hair and fits a com device in his ear. He locks and unlocks in the seconds it takes her to complete the motion. "You'll hear everything I do. I'll be able to hear you, but you don't have to say anything if you don't want to."

The metal fingers touch the little bud in his ear. He blinks at her. There's something stirring under the surface: fish about to bite.

"OK."

"Watch my back?" Natalia says lowly.

His lips form the word 'yes,' but he doesn't say it. Bows his head a few degrees. Just like that, the wind is slicing through Klara right into Natalia again. Klara smiles and steps purposefully toward Haxenhaus. Passersby that dare make eye contact are rewarded with smiles and sparkling eyes. She winks at one lady, waves to a cute baby, sticks her tongue out at a preteen who rolls her eyes, and bites her lip at a young professional.

Klara sure is someone.

The sound of high heels on pavement has always been one of Natalia's favorite sounds. There are a lot of different kinds of tapping — she likes most kinds. This kind is familiar, like the hollow sound of toe boxes slamming down in an empty studio.

At her table, Klara talks too much with the wait staff. She's alone in a restaurant. It's something a woman like Klara becomes self-conscious about. She panders and talks and tries to convince strangers working in a restaurant that she's not a loser, she swears. Klara looks around nervously; is someone looking at her and judging her for coming to eat alone? Simultaneously, Natalia takes in her surroundings, chronicles the layout and the people.

Klara gives a woman a twitch of her lips when she catches the stranger looking. Natalia memorizes the woman's appearance (white skin, long face, nice cheekbones, blue eyes, blonde hair, estimated twenty-three years old) and makes a note to keep an eye on her. There's a man sitting at the table with the woman (dark brown skin, bald, round head, lines around the mouth, estimated forty-nine years old). He's talking and smiling. The woman's eyes slide away from Klara's face and over her shoulder. Eyes light up — mouth opens and she waves to someone over Klara's shoulder. A man hugs the woman and then joins her at the table. It's the young professional (short, sandy hair, squashed face) Klara had bit her lip at.

 _Fuck_.

"Miss Alexandrova?"

It's Oskar Rainer.

Klara jumps to her feet and smiles wide. "Oskar! Please, call me Klara. I thought you were going to stand me up!" Remember: Klara is insecure.

He holds Klara's forearms and kisses her; Natalia struggles.

"Oh, never, never. How could I ignore one so stunning?"

Flattery. The woman, the man, and the young professional are taking turns watching them.

 _Fuckity fuck fuck._

"You're sweet. Sit, please. I'm starving — I waited for you."

They order food. They talk. It looks like a date. It _feels_ like a date. Klara sits with her elbows on the table with her arms crossed so a gap forms at the neckline of her top. The hit doesn't come up while they eat appetizers and sip drinks (it's never too early for drinks!). With an audience, Klara feels exhilarated. She really puts on a show. She tells stories that are too long and that she knows Rainer doesn't want to listen to. She reaches across the table to touch his arm when she laughs. It wasn't the plan, but Klara monopolizes the conversation and drags out the meeting. She has to.

The black man, the woman, and the young professional leave while Klara and Rainer are on their entrees. They'd be done by now, but Klara's been eating at a glacial pace because of all her talking. Twice the wait staff has asked her if she'd like a box for leftovers. They want to turn the table over, but Natalia isn't done here yet. Rainer doesn't pay attention to her anymore. He just stares at her chest.

Whatever. There are worse things he could have been doing. At least he isn't touching her under the tablecloth.

Klara's finally done eating and, after the plates are taken away, she says, "So what about that thing I asked you for?"

Rainer starts. Blinks. Looks away from Klara's breasts. She can see it on his face: _Finally._

"I've had a chance to review the information you provided me. Your target . . . she is interesting. An enigma."

Klara's face darkens. "She crippled my nephew. Killed my sister. Not to mention all those other children she hurt. There's no doubt that she'll do it all again. It can't be that way."

Rainer sucks in a breath and shakes his head. "Personal revenge —"

"Is the engine that runs your business," she says. "Look, I can pay for it. There's nothing in your petty rules about having a good enough reason for the job. There's no justification necessary. If I can pay, you can make it happen."

He scratches his chin. "This is true. I do not deny it, miss."

"Then what's the hold up? Do you want more money? I'll pay whatever you want if it puts an end to her. She's _here_ and I want her gone tonight."

Rainer actually doesn't have a problem accepting the hit. He just has to pander. It's all part of the show. The Red Room can't look like it accepts jobs from just anybody. That's why they had brokers like Oskar Rainer. All the jobs he submitted to the Red Room were small and petty. Natalia Romanova had never been assigned one of these small-time jobs. They were for the spiderlings; when they get their first solo operations and drop poison into drinks and bullets into hearts. Even as a spiderling, Natalia Romanova was given assignments bigger than those which Rainer made a living negotiating.

Water builds up in Klara's eyes. "It's been so long since I've felt safe."

Rainer sighs. "Alright. I'll make the call. But how do you know she'll be at that address? I don't want to be sending someone into a trap."

Klara rolls her eyes. She's glad he asked. "I have it on good information. I hired a PI just like in the movies. They've been tailing her for months. She's a monster, but she's not the best there is. She leaves quite a trail. Not to mention that she has a job there. Supposed to steal some parts or a design or _something_. I don't know — the PI does. It's all in there."

 _There_ is the file she hands him. Documents for his own records.

Seven more minutes and they're standing beside the table. Klara hugs him and Natalia sticks a bug under Rainer's collar while her arms are around him. He takes advantage of their situation, too: his hands wander, intrude. In her ear, Natalia hears the Soldier take a sharp intake of breath.

Klara and Rainer separate.

"Thanks for lunch," she says and saunters out.

She goes to a store which has only one bathroom. Pulls out a plastic bag from Klara's purse. She peels off the prosthetics, takes off the wig, and then washes off the makeup. Takes out the contacts and puts it all in the bag. Shaking out her hair, it falls in irregular waves around her face. There's a change of clothes. The bag containing Klara's face and style goes back in her purse. It's not Natalia that looks back at her in the mirror when she's done. It's just a girl on a mission.

Rainer's life fills in the background noise. She hears him pay for the meal and grumble. She hears street sounds, a door slamming. Humming. He's in a car.

When she steps out of the store, she says, "Yakov."

A pause.

 _One, two, three, four, five, six._

He speaks, tells her the location of the car (and the make, model, color, and license plate). What direction it's going, how fast.

Bless him.

Conveniently, there's a motorbike parked up the block. She steals it (thanks for leaving the helmet, irresponsible owner) and rides after the car. She locates it three kilometers later. Following it is easy. It parks in a structure. She leaves the bike on the curb outside a bar. Taps on Klara's phone even though she isn't Klara right now. Looking busy is important. Normal people don't just stand around waiting for their prey. They try to look busy so people won't think they're alone.

Rainer exits the parking structure at street level and heads west. So that's what she does, too. They arrive at a park. They walk a trail. They watch the children playing; they're round and funny-looking in their puffy jackets. He sits at a bench. She sits beneath a tree and pulls a book from Klara's bag: _Flowers for Algernon_.

The woman from Haxenhaus joins Rainer on the bench nineteen minutes and four seconds later. She's also in different clothes. And her hair isn't blonde anymore. It's brown.

 _Fuck again._

Natalia snaps the book closed and rolls to her feet. She starts walking away. There has to be a barrier. Abandon close surveillance.

"Yakov," she breathes.

"Kite."

She sees a kite with a long tail being flown on a hill to her left. She veers off so that her back is to the hill. She doesn't run. Her steps are casual. Pulling out Klara's phone she puts it up to her ear and laughs even though no one is close enough to hear — they're close enough to see. She mouths some words. Pauses. Aloud, she says, "Meet me."

In her ear, Rainer: "That's what she gave me."

The woman: "Thanks. You hear anything? You think it's really her?"

"Seems suspicious."

"These people's business is suspicion. We've got eyes. You pass anything along?"

There's no words. Rainer must be shaking his head. "Figured you guys would take it from here."

The Soldier is loping into the park. He looks more natural than Natalia ever thought he was capable of looking. She Klara-smiles at him. He smiles back as best he can.

"Put your arm around me," she says.

They're not close yet, but he hears it because of the com. When they meet, he swings an arm around her, turning one hundred and eighty degrees so they're walking in the same direction. Her hip bumps his hip. Her shoulder touches his rib cage. Klara takes Natalia's arm and puts it around the Soldier's waist so they're holding each other together.

She can't be Klara right now, and Natalia is frozen and scared. So she pulls on the worn mantle of Nadine Roman. She talks less than Klara. They walk back in the direction of their hotel and listen to Rainer and the woman not talk about setting up defenses around the industrial building the hit is going to take place in tonight. Nadine and the Soldier release each other when the park is no longer in view. There's space for another person between them. A few people actually do pass them by walking in that gap. Along the way, Nadine buys herself and the Soldier peppermint hot chocolate.


	6. Chapter 6

Back at their hotel, Natalia thaws and takes over the body again. The minute they're through the door, the Soldier takes off his boots and plucks the com device out of his ear. He leaves it on the same table he put their bags when they first arrived. Methodically, he disarms himself. Seven knives and four guns. Light day.

Then he faces her, looks at the floor, and stands at attention. Waiting for orders.

She gets more overpriced food and leaves the Soldier with instructions to "eat until you're full." It takes a few minutes for her to dispose of the bag containing Klara's face. In the bathroom, she locks the door and runs the shower until the mirror fogs over. Natalia sits on the toilet and breathes deeply, hands clenching.

Eventually, she gets in the shower and washes everything away under lukewarm water. She feels covered in spider webs. Normally, she didn't even register the feeling. But today it felt dirty and confining. Like she had strings that had been cut but not removed.

The Soldier hasn't moved from his place on the couch. But he's taken his socks off. Natalia smirks at his feet; they're nearly as gnarled and scarred as hers. She flops down on the opposite end of the couch and bounces a little on the seat. He looks over at her with tension in his brow.

"How much did you eat?" she says. The tray looks damn near full. The food has been moved around, but she isn't fooled. Hardly any has been eaten.

His lips purse. "Until I was full."

"I shouldn't have given you such vague orders."

There is a look of amusement hidden under that mask of stoicism. Natalia's sure of it.

"You can give another order."

Reaching a hand out, she says, "May I?"

He stares at the hand and nods as if he's afraid what will happen if he refuses. Natalia pinches the back of his right hand. Retreats back to her corner. Nodding to the pitcher of water on the tray, she says, "Drink all of that. You don't have to do it all at once. If you're still thirsty, get some more. Or tell me, if you don't want to do it yourself."

"Understood."

"I said you had to sleep today. You can do it now or you can do it after tonight. But I want you asleep before the sun rises tomorrow morning."

The Soldier nods.

"So when is it?"

"After," he says. Hesitates. Adds, "Can't sleep well before missions."

 _Not unless he's in a frozen box_.

She nods. "That's OK. As long as you get some sleep."

She turns on the television. "What do you want to watch?" she says. She smiles to herself. The question is futile and it amuses her to ask.

The Soldier apparently hates the question, because when faced with it, he shoves bread in his mouth. It's almost impressive how he can avoid answering direct questions by following previous orders. Natalia wonders about his captivity. How long he must have been under someone's thumb to have figured out ways to get around his own programming.

She laughs at his puffed-out cheeks and hears him exhale some amusement, too. They watch a cooking show. Maybe it'll make the Soldier hungry and he'll eat more. That thought makes Natalia smile, too. He already looks drawn and it's only been a few days. How badly did they fuck with his metabolism? They turned him into a Lamborghini: capable of amazing feats even while it consumes itself.

Hours later, Natalia gets ready to head out to the industrial building. For some reason, the sight of her getting ready puts the Soldier on edge. He alternatively stares at her, wrings his mismatched hands, and stares duck-faced out the window. She's finally in her best skin: the Black Widow suit with Bites on her wrists. Maybe she goes out of her way to hide the EMPs from the Soldier's view. Maybe not.

Adjusting her power source, she says, "You're coming, too, you know."

The Soldier stops pacing toward the window. He looks relieved. Eyes go immediately to his arsenal.

Natalia feels comfortable and almost stable. The mission is shit but she's feeling good. Indulgently, she said, "You can only bring one gun."

Amazingly, beautifully — the Soldier gives her the dirtiest, most withering look she's ever seen. She bursts out laughing. He turns away from her before she can see his face react. It's fun to watch him deliberate. The Škorpion gets tossed aside immediately. The rifles go more slowly, like it pains him to discard them. A good minute passes as the Soldier weighs a CZUB in his left hand and a SIG Sauer in the right. In the end, he picks a SIG Sauer P226. Figures.

They steal a car to get to the industrial building. Natalia drives and the Soldier sits in the backseat. She would have thought he'd ride shotgun — ha, ha. She leaves it at that, doesn't entertain any possible explanations for why he automatically goes in the back. The car is left three kilometers away from the building.

Outside the car, she says, "Stay out of sight. Watch my back?"

He mouths the word 'yes' again. Why doesn't he say it? Why does he only say it _sometimes_?

They take separate routes to the building. It's unlocked, but Natalia stretches her legs and goes in the spider's way. Sneaking through cracks, swinging on her silk. It feels _good_. As she drops down on the small block of offices inside the factory, she thinks about how the Soldier's going to get in. He's a ghost — is he going to just pass through the walls? A smile curls her face.

Up among the catwalks, she sees him jump from a railing and swing onto a pipe. The momentum carries him up to the blades of a fan. It spins when he lands on it. After a sixty-degree rotation, he drops off of it and onto the top of a shelving unit. The barrels on the shelf don't even vibrate when he lands on top of them. Natalia makes eye contact with him. She waves a hand and goes into the offices.

She goes into an office that belongs to the Manufacturing Engineer, according to the sign. The computer begins to hum when she bumps the mouse. While it configures itself, she looks around the office and goes through the engineer's stuff. There's a drawer of snacks. She opens a Haribo packet and eats all the red and green ones. Rainer thinks the target will be here stealing something important. How upset they'll all be when it's just Natalia eating an engineer's gummy bears.

The computer is finally awake. She sits at the desk and puts her feet up. The desktop is a picture of a family someplace tropical. Aruba, maybe. Looks nice. She passes some time going through his files. There're a lot of pictures. Who puts personal stuff like that on a work computer? She clicks through a few of his CAD files; nothing interesting. It's all just machine components and junk.

She hears a scuff after she closes a folder containing the CVs of potential engineering interns. The Soldier doesn't scuff. Showtime.

It comes from behind her: "Don't move."

Male voice. She does as it says. Looks at the computer screen at the right angle and sees the reflection of the squashed-face young professional from earlier. He has an honest-to-God _arrow_ drawn and aimed at her in an honest-to-God _bow_.

Well, she wasn't expecting _that_.

"Now that's a twist," she says.

"You're Romanoff."

He's American. Great.

"I am."

"You got two choices."

She takes her feet off the desk and stands up. Turns around. The young professional had tensed but didn't shoot. Good to know.

"You didn't introduce yourself," she says. "I'm Romanoff, and who are you?"

"Agent," he says.

"Agent who?"

"It's _Doctor_ Who." He smirks at her. He's not funny.

She blinks at him and smiles blankly. It's unnerving — that's why she does it.

"It's Barton."

"Agent Barton. Hi."

Another scuff.

"That's enough fraternizing, don't you think, Barton?" said a voice behind Natalia. It's the woman.

"Nothing wrong with a little conversation," he says.

Natalia arches her eyebrow at Agent Barton and turns toward the woman. It's no fun having your back turned to a bow and arrow, but it's what she's got. Knowing the Soldier is just on the other side of the wall makes Natalia feel immeasurably better.

"We haven't been introduced," says Natalia to the woman.

"The building is completely surrounded. You can come quietly or you can come bleeding."

"Who do you work for?" said Natalia. "You've really been giving us a hard time. Stealing our secrets and giving us a bad name."

"You give yourselves a bad name," the woman says. "What you do to _children_ — it's sick."

The spiderlings. Natalia feels threatened, insulted. But she's been in this type of situation before. She says, "Is this your first mission, Agent? Have you ever been in charge of an operation of this size before?"

She hasn't. It's clear on her face. And it's not there on purpose to mislead Natalia. It's genuine. She's unnerved by Natalia despite her solid cover. Turning to Agent Barton, she says, "Is it your first time?"

"Not by a long shot, Red. You gonna do this the easy way?"

She steps back toward the windows. If the building truly is surrounded, then someone will have an excellent shot. If the building truly is surrounded, then it won't be for long, not while there's a ghost in their midst. The woman's gun and the agent's arrow follow her so that they're forming a triangle instead of a straight line.

"I'm afraid not."

There's another scuff, but it's different.

The woman turns and holds two fingers to her ear. "Coms are dead," she says despite herself. Definitely her first time as mission head.

Curiously, Agent Barton doesn't seem as concerned. She notices that he has two devices in his ears — hearing aids. Interesting.

There's sounds of a struggle, a muffled scream. Gunshots. Natalia reaches for her EMPs. Agent Barton sees the motion. He releases the arrow. A lot of things happen after that:

Natalia turns but feels the arrowhead bury itself in the back of her shoulder.

There's a crash, a metallic _thunk_ , and a brilliant, blinding flash of white light.

Wild gunshots. Not a chance they've been aimed at anything in particular. Scared and defensive.

A voice shouting, "Hill, watch—!"

Hard thumps.

Something hard crashes into Natalia. It grabs her and glass shatters. It's the Soldier carrying her away.

Seriously, bless him.

Natalia's whole body is throbbing. It's all she can think about as the Soldier spirits her away. There was something on that arrowhead. She bites her lip hard because of the pain. Fuck Agent Barton and his fucking drugs.

Natalia doesn't realize she's been put on the ground until the Soldier is back and picking her up. "Hold on to me," he says.

She clings. The pain is helpful: It locks her hands around the Soldier's vest. Holding on is easy. There may be shots chasing them, but they sound very distant. Next, there's a snarl. Mechanical. Wind. Are they moving? It's hard to care. The place where Natalia's face is pressed to the Soldier's shoulder is wet. It's so foggy and dark. It's slippery. She can't hold on.

—

When her eyes open next, she's screaming. There's pressure on the back of her shoulder. It hurts it _hurts_. She can't hold on.

—

Blearily, she wakes again. It's hot and humid and she's stiff and overstuffed. She's lying on her stomach without any clothes on. Bed — she's lying in a bed. The comforter over her is so _hot_. Cool metal touches her forearm.

"Yakov," she tries to say around her swollen tongue.

"Hush," says his voice. It's soft. The metal is cool.

There's a pinch in her arm. She can't hold on.

—

The third time, she feels much closer to normal. Not so slow and overflowing. She knows she's in a dim room. It's cool; there's the comfortable sound of the air conditioner whirling. Her stomach feels hollow. Her throat feels dry. But everything is heavy, and she's still tired.

Somewhere, a breath catches. The Soldier.

She's still lying naked on her stomach under the warm comforter. She rolls her head in the direction of the sound. The Soldier's grabbing at the hair around his temples. He's sitting in a chair that's so close to the bed that his knees touch the mattress. Jaw clenching. A squealy grunt climbs through his teeth.

Natalia reaches a clumsy hand out. "Hey," she says.

The Soldier makes another grunt and jerks away from her hand. There's a knife in his lap. There's _blood_ on a knife in his lap. There's a tear in the thigh of his pants, saturated with blood. Bare feet — he's in bare feet.

She draws her hand back. "How long?" she croaks.

"Thirty-eight hours," he says. Still won't look at her.

It _feels_ like it's been one hundred hours. Natalia feels like she's inside a jar of syrup. Her eyes rove away from him and take in the room. It's not the hotel they were staying at. It's someplace new. It's even nicer than the first place they stayed at. But there are all their bags on a round table.

"Tell me."

He stops pulling at his hair but his hands stay tangled there. "You put a hit out on yourself."

She doesn't say anything.

"The mission is to protect you, but the mission is also to follow your orders." Tugs on his hair. "If you die, it's mission failure. I-I can't go back with you dead. I can't — mission failure."

"Were you seen?" she says.

"No."

"Hey." This time her hand reaches his flesh wrist and guides it away from his face. She can see his face now: pale and drawn. Bruises on his cheeks. Bandages on his right arm and stains on his undershirt. Red stains. He's exhausted. They said he doesn't need much rest but it's been far too long. She'd told him to go to sleep after the mission, but —

"I have to watch my team. I had to make sure you — . . . I kept — I couldn't." Breathing is shallow. He sways, sags in his seat, eyelids flutter. Suddenly, the metal hand grabs the knife. He stabs it into his thigh. Awake again.

Natalia tries to be alarmed but there're still drugs in her system and she's slow. "Hey! No!"

The Soldier yanks it out and throws it away. Blood stains the carpet. Both hands go back to his head. The fingers press hard into his scalp. "I'm sorry. I'm sorry. Self-harm is not allowed — I know, I'm sorry. But sleeping while you're . . . that's also not acceptable. The body kept — I couldn't. It was the only way to stop it from shutting down."

He's been stabbing himself to stay awake. He's not allowed to hurt himself. He's breaking the rules for her; he's doing things that aren't allowed so he can watch over her. So he can take care of her.

"Wha-what they'd _do_ to me if you — if I came back — . . ." He tugs hard on his hair and grunts through his teeth again. "I am compromised."

Her eyes feel heavy. She can't do this the right way. Not now. Lifting the comforter she's under, she says, "Lie down next to me."

It makes his face spasm. He looks struck. Panicked. Natalia scoots over on her stomach to make room. He gets up, bloody thigh and all, and awkwardly gets in bed beside her. The comforter falls down over both of them. The fog is heavy around Natalia, but she can feel the whole bed shaking with the Soldier's nerves. His breathing is loud. It dreads.

"Close your eyes."

She puts an arm around the Soldier's abdomen, grounding him. Her hip touches his hip. Her skin touches his skin. With her hand cradling his metal-reinforced ribs, she can feel his chest expand unevenly. Can feel his heart beat wild and scared. She turns her head away from him and closes her eyes. The fog is dense and warm. She lets go.


	7. Chapter 7

The fourth time she wakes up, Natalia _actually_ wakes up. Her neck hurts from sleeping in such a strange position. The muscles scream when she turns her head toward the Soldier. He's sleeping — she can tell from the way his ribs move. Thank God. He's turned on his side, his back to her. Natalia's arm is still around him. Her fingertips rest like feathers on his abs. His stomach is hard even when he's lying slack, asleep.

A body should not be that way.

From this position, she can see rusty stains on his back. Through his shirt.

Natalia's shoulder aches. She's had worse. The drugs are gone and she can tell that it's been properly treated. The Soldier knows what he's doing when it comes to first aid. Is it a saving grace for his handlers? They taught him how to take a life one thousand and one different ways with his bare hands, but they taught him how to save a life, too. The contrast makes her feel mixed up.

Then she cramps up; nature is calling. Withdrawing her arm, she rolls away from the Soldier and onto her back. The pressure hurts her shoulder but it's OK. She's had so much worse. Pain has been much more intense after she's stood on her toes for hours at a time, bleeding in unison with twenty-seven other spiderlings.

She eases into a sitting position on the edge of the mattress. Her feet touch the carpet. The Soldier moans low in his throat.

"Don' geh uh," he slurs.

"I'm OK," she says.

"Yer hurt. Don' geh uh. Wuh ya nee? I'll do it."

"You made me better. I'm OK."

"Liar."

 _Well, yeah. But not right at this particular moment._

She smiles and almost snorts. It's just a rush of wind out of her nose.

"Really. I'm OK. Go back to sleep."

The Soldier makes the strangest whiny sound. Squirms. Lets out a long exhale. There's no question about it: It's cute.

"Kay," he says.

She gets back on her feet and staggers a few steps before her feet and legs remember how to walk after lying prone for so long. She sees a large, white linen bag near a door — she assumes it's the exit to the hallway. It's stuffed; something large is in there. Another comforter? She glances back at the bed. The bedding is decidedly less fancy than the rest of the place. Her stomach cramps again.

Oh.

Well. Thank you, Soldier.

She finds the bathroom after a few seconds glancing around and opening a few wrong doors. Turns on the light. Closes the door. Locks it. Makes a point not to look in the mirror. There's one on the vanity and a full length one on the back of the door. Too many eyes looking at her. She wants to run the shower until they get covered in steam and the air is wet in her lungs. But the sound would probably wake up the Soldier and _keep_ him up.

In front of the mirror, she twists and tries to get a look at her wound. All she can see is a white bandage taped there. It's clean. There's nothing seeping through and staining. Unlike the rust on the Soldier's back. The ache is the only thing she feels. The ache and a little itchiness as it just begins to heal.

Natalia closes her eyes, sits on the toilet, and feels like she pisses five liters.

Before she leaves, she thinks of food. And water. She wants both of them _bad_. She drinks from her cupped hands under the sink in the bathroom. Doesn't even care if her reflection catches glimpses of her. She searches the rooms for some sort of hotel stationary, very aware of the closed bedroom door and the Soldier sleeping behind it. She finds what she's looking for in the common area by the television.

He brought her to Denmark. She orders damn near the entire menu, unsure of what time of day it is and what would be appropriate to order. Asks the woman on the phone not to knock on the door. She doesn't sound surprised. On quiet toes, Natalia retrieves her bags from the table in the bedroom. Brings it into the common area, shutting the door slowly and silently behind her. Puts on loose clothes. They feel cold. It's nice.

Natalia meets the delivery at the door. Thanks the attendant in Danish. She eats so much and so fast she almost feels like it'll be busting out of her any second. The only thing that stops her is the fact that her shoulder aches just enough to convince her it is wise to eat one-handed. No double-fisting smørrebrød today.

She's guzzling water when she plucks a folded piece of paper off the tray. The food's been charged to an account bearing the name Seymour Butz. How the Soldier came to have access to such an account, she has no idea. But she _has_ to hear that story.

Flicking on the television, she mutes it as soon as she's able. Turns on closed captions. Finds nothing good to watch. Settles on an animated movie. As she watches the images, she stretches her arm. The stiffness eases and motion experiences less resistance. She sweats from the soreness and exertion. The feeling doesn't stop her because she's a spider. She needs all her legs to spin webs, to swing. To climb up the water spout after the rain.

Spiders can dance, and she dances. A good dancer does not come to be that way through power or grace, though those are byproducts of what it _really_ takes: Control.

She's three movies deep into this marathon of animation — stuffing her face absently with leftovers on the tray — when she hears the Soldier whine from the bedroom. Natalia rolls to her feet just like she always does; the pain doesn't hinder her movement or make her hesitate. Spiders aren't afraid to fall.

No staggering when she walks this time. She opens the door and settles in the chair the Soldier had been sitting in the last time she woke up. There's a tiny bloodstain on the seat. Seymour Butz is going to have quite the cleaning charge on his account.

The Soldier's rolled onto his other side — into the place where Natalia used to be. He tenses and contracts. Whines. Loosens and turns on his other side. She reaches out and puts a hand on the side of his face. The skin is hot. She covers his ear with her hand and runs her thumb over his eyebrow until the lines on his forehead soften and smooth. Eyelashes flutter but his eyes don't open. She knows he's awake.

"You're alright," she says.

"Who?"

"It's me. It's Natalia."

His eyebrows draw down under her thumb, like he's confused. Like she's said the wrong thing.

"Natalia," he says.

"You're alright," she says because those lines on his face look so, so disappointed. "You need to drink something and eat." Waits. "Can you become ill?"

A pitiful noise from the back of his throat. "I am vulnerable to disease and infection."

She can't remember if it's always been that way. Before, when she was just a girl, a juvenile spider caught in-between — did he get sick?

"Do you require aid?" she says.

"No." Flat. Quick. Lie.

"You need to drink and eat."

His eyelids peel open. He looks at her blearily. She waits for the eyes to focus. It takes too long; she thinks maybe she should think about worrying. "I'm compromised," he tells her.

"You said that."

Eyes close again. He rubs his head into the pillow, away from her hand. She brings it back to her lap. There's another sound. She thinks it's a held-in whine. It's pitiful.

"I want—" He cuts himself off. Hands clench.

"What do you want?" she whispers. They're at a precipice, the two of them.

"I. I-I w-want — I can't want. I wish — I want," he stutters into the pillow. Whole body tense.

Oh.

Natalia leans toward him and puts her hand next to his. Touches her skin to his metal. She hadn't asked the right question.

"Who do you want?"

The Soldier makes a noise like he wants to scream. "I don't remember."

* * *

 **Note:**

 **I have no idea why, but when I write Nat, everything gets edited down to its bones. (I.e., underhanded, shameless self-promotion for _The Music Box_.)**

 **In case you're not too familiar with old people music, the title of this work is borrowed from a song of the same name. If you're into extracurricular activities, I suggest The Platters' version.**

 **Thanks for reading and reviewing and following! Hi-ho.**


	8. Chapter 8

**Note:**

 **Mind the rating for this chapter. There's nothing too explicit, but there are some serious implications.**

* * *

Somehow, she coaxes him to get up and drives him too fast to the couch in the common area. Sits him down immediately because his face goes white and chalky when he's upright.

 _Not now, Soldier_ , she thinks. _Don't do this so soon. Not yet._

"Shirt off," she says.

He literally rips the thing off with his left hand. That wasn't what she meant, but it was certainly effective. His back is a wash of red ranging from near-pink to deep violet. No chance he could get to some of the wounds back there.

There are still cartoons playing on the television. She unmutes it and says, "Lie on your stomach." Then she heads back to the bedroom for the rest of their bags and the first aid kit. She thinks she hears him say "I'm sorry" in a really small, scared voice, but she can't be sure.

When she comes back, she kneels on the carpet beside the couch. Aid kit is opened. There's one wound which looks like it was caused by a bullet. The skin around it is hot and puffy. There's an exit wound on his front; she saw it. He'd taken care of everything he could reach. It was just his back that needs attention.

She tries very hard not to look so long at the line where flesh turned to metal. It's not like a snap. He can't simply pop the arm on and off. It lives inside him where she can't see. She's fairly certain some of his nerves exist in the center of the upper arm, too. They're not a round peg in a round hole, the Soldier and his arm. They're one and the same, grafted onto each other. _Into_ each other. Metal inside him, flesh inside it.

He breathes choppily as she works. Makes cleaning the wound difficult. He dreads. She ignores and works. No time for this. Too soon to lose the Soldier. She needs him coherent for a little longer. Hadn't planned on him breaking like this so soon.

What had done it? What had happened in those thirty-eight hours that busted open his dry shell?

She fixes a bandage to his back. Tells him he can sit up. He does it fast and curls around the armrest, chest heaving. She tosses him a shirt from one of the bags. He puts that on too fast also and curls up again. In the aid kit are syringes with pre-measured drugs already in their cylinders. Petrenko had told her to administer a single injection if the Asset exhibited sluggish recovery after taking a wound. She doesn't know whether or not she should do as that man told her.

The Soldier sees her staring at the first aid kit and says, "Give it to me."

She does. He injects himself with shaking hands. Tosses the spent syringe on the coffee table. Tries to relax into the couch. Natalia watches him closely.

"It helps," he says. "Increases cellular regeneration and reboots the immune system."

He's trying to tell her that it's not psychoactive. He's trying to tell her that he's not designed to last very long. Nothing stays, he's trying to tell her. Without ice and help, he'll melt back into — into what? A man? A corpse?

They waste a good forty minutes fighting over food.

"Eat this," she says.

"No."

"Please eat this."

"I don't w-want it."

"At least drink some of this. You need it. You feel this way because your body is consuming itself. You're starving and dehydrated and exhausted."

"I'm OK. I just got the injection."

"Drink. The fucking. Water. Yakov."

He only does it when she gets him a straw. What a diva.

"Now eat something. Anything. Just eat."

"I don't need it."

"You do."

"I'm OK."

"You're delirious. Your body is sludge. Eat."

"The water made me full."

" _The water made you full!_ "

She never does convince him to eat anything substantial. She puts about seven sugar packets in his water.

A movie about a lost mouse is nearing its end when Natalia asks a different question, "Self-harm is not allowed, huh?"

The Soldier nods his head and puts the empty water glass on the coffee table. Natalia thinks about calling for some hot chocolate — something with some fat in it.

He says, "They told me — that if — if I wanted to bleed, all I had to do was ask."

That's something very similar to what Natalia's heard. They'd help you bleed, but they wouldn't let you die. Not for nothing would they give you an out. She's seen it firsthand. A spiderling that tried to bite herself when she was just ten years old. It didn't work. Didn't work. She died on her first mission: A distraction in the streets for someone else to live.

The credits roll on the mouse movie after he's reunited with his family.

"What'd you do?" she says.

Shrug. Looks at his flesh hand. "Only one of them bleeds. Wasn't enough. Not fast enough."

"Would have never worked," she says. "You knew that."

The Soldier nods. "Guess the body didn't want to die."

No. No, bodies go to extreme lengths to stay alive. Bodies crave life so _much_. When the mind gives up, the body clings to life. The way they change, knit themselves back together. Bodies don't want to die.

Getting up, she searches the kitchenette. There're powdered hot chocolate packets among the teabags. She dumps three packets into a mug and heats the water. She finds a chocolate bar that's surely overpriced (put it on Mr. Butz bill, please and thank you). Breaking it into small chucks, she drops that into the mug, too. The hot water will melt it. Won't be great, but it'll be something he sorely needs. In the background, a new animated movie begins. A young cartoon princess sings a duet with a moping princeling about how much they loath each other.

Slowly, she sits beside the Soldier on the couch. There's still space between them. She hands him the mug. Doesn't take any convincing for him to start sipping it. Her eyes are on the bruised flesh of his thigh that's visible through his torn trousers. Wonders if that's healing up OK. Her eyes go back to the television. She doesn't want to touch his thigh, is pretty sure he doesn't want her to either.

Why did he crack so soon?

"What do you remember?" she says. Because that had to have been it.

The princess and the prince are now of age and are dancing in a ballroom. The prince doesn't loath the princess anymore because the princess is pretty after puberty. A tiny internal part of Natalia cheers when the princess tells the prince to fuck off when he asks what else there is besides beauty.

(Spiders don't make cocoons and emerge beautiful and doomed.)

The Soldier shakes his head and looks down at that tear. "I remember th— . . . They put things in me. Drugs in my blood. Metal under my skin. Pictures in my head. They p-put — they put things in my mouth." The Soldier gnashes his teeth together; perhaps just to make sure he can still open and close his jaws at will. "Rubber so I didn't bite my tongue. Cloth so I didn't talk — I didn't talk anyway. Maybe they didn't want me to scream anymore — to cry."

It sounds like he's going to cry now. Natalia watches the television as hard as she can. The princess's father is telling the asshole prince that it's not what it seems. If she looks at the Soldier, she knows she'll break him. Because there's more they did to his mouth. She _knows_. (It's happened to her.)

The Soldier shudders and says, "They put — . . . When I didn't eat, they put a Whitehead gag in my mouth, and I — I. When I did eat, they still — but it wasn't for food. I di-didn't — I didn't want them to —"

He can't. Neither could she, if their places were reversed.

The villain in the movie tells his captive princess that, once you steal something, you spend your whole life fighting to keep it.

"They — they'd put needles in my veins and — and — they'd hur—touch me. Wouldn't listen — it wouldn't listen!" His voice hitches and then crashes back down. "Body wouldn't _listen_ and they — they'd ask me if — ask if I-I-I l- _liked_ — _they wouldn't listen._ "

The voice begs her to understand what he can't articulate. Natalia knows. She _knows._ (It's happened to her.)

He shakes his head. Shakes his head. Shakes his head. "I-I-I-I'd ask what the mission was — and they'd laugh an-and ask if I — . . . I'd say what's the mission, what's the mission. Then — then there were things in me an-an-and — I couldn't. I wanted, I thought I wanted — I w-wanted s-someone to be—to be looking f-for me. S-someone _good_ t-to be looking f-f-for me. I _screamed_ f-for — I screamed for S-s-s-st— . . . I'd scream."

Natalia is feeling her skin shrink against her bones. It's becoming too tight. One wrong move and she'll rupture.

( _Crack_ and gruesome satisfaction.)

"I remem — I-I'd just b-been w-woken — once when I wa-was still fr-frozen —" The Soldier is cut off by a gasp. Lungs betray him. He can't go on.

Can't go on.

His hands go to his head again. Grip tight around the roots of his hair. "They kept doing it — kept putting things _in_ me. I didn't — I don't. It wasn't what I want — . . . An-and I know they — they took something _out_ but I can't remember what it is."

 _They didn't take something out. They took_ everything _out._

Natalia knows. She _knows_. (It's happened to her.)

"I know," she says to the television.

"Did they take something out of you, too?"

"Yes."

"Do you know what they took?"

"Yes."

"Can you get it back?"

Could she? Could Natalia get back that sprouting life that they'd cut off when she was rejected by the flames?

"No. But I'm making a new one."

The Soldier makes a frustrated noise. "Have they — did anyone ever — . . . Have you b-been hur— _touched_ like me—like that?"

(It's happened to her.)

(It's _happened to her._ )

"No," she tells the television. "That's never been done to me."

It was different. For her, it wasn't like that. She was trained. Spiders are trained. It was something she needed to know and it was taught to her. It wasn't like it was for the Soldier. She wasn't — they never — It was different for her. It was different for all the spiderlings — no, but they were spiders by then; no longer small and without choices to make. They never took. The Red Room didn't do that. Didn't take like that.

Her skin is so tight. It's going to compress her into something dense and inescapable.

(It's happened to her.)

The Soldier's voice comes out shaking: "Have you —"

But Natalia's on her feet and her eyes are fire and she's staring at him — breaking him with her eyes of fire. He crumples like paper. Collapses like the house of cards he is; weak.

"Shut up," she says. Quiet and controlled. She has control. She's always had control. Always. "Shut up. Stop talking."

Natalia knows what she's doing. She's all about control. Discipline.

"Shut up."

She flees for the bathroom. She flicks on the lights. Slams the door. Locks it. Throws herself at the shower and turns the water on. Sheds her clothes like they cause her pain, like they weigh the same as all those who got caught in her webs. Stands under the water until it's scalding and she's burning like she should have in the flames. Until she can't tell where it's raining from: above her or within her.

With water running into her mouth, she says, "Why didn't anyone take care of you?"

Natalia knows.

She _knows_.

(It's happened to her.)

It's a long time before she comes out of the water. She sits on the toilet, edges brittle from the flames. Waits until the fog fades from the mirrors. Lets her reflection look at her and see what's left and what's been burned away. Then she unlocks the door, opens it, and turns the light out.

The Soldier's right where she left him: curled into a corner of the couch. But now the television is off and Klara's mp3 player is filling the room with Bobby Vinton. She kneels down in front of him until he looks at her edges. Her brittle edges.

"I shouldn't have said that to you," she says.

He shakes his head. Natalia can't tell if he's agreeing with her or dismissing the words. It doesn't really matter. His lips part — they're cracked. He needs to drink more.

"You asked what I remembered," he says.

She looks and finds his eyes. _Finally_.

Hesitantly, he unfolds himself so his hands are free. He holds them out awkwardly, afraid to do something wrong.

Natalia nods at him. Permission granted.

The hands reach toward her face and she has an iron grip on the panic it induces. She closes her eyes anyway. The Soldier's hands gently hold either side of her face. One hand is hot and the other is cool. She hears him shift toward her until his lips brush the top of her head.

"I remember this," he breathes into her hair.

It's a secret. It's precious information.

Natalia knows this: youth, pride in her accomplishments, trust in her instructor, the foreign feeling of protection. Natalia knows what it is to be loved purely and innocently. She knows what it is to be helped and taught and to have her back be watched. She knows what it is to be encouraged and smiled at and listened to. Natalia knows safety in the hands of a ghost; he'd haunt the world if she only asked him to.

The Soldier starts to pull away, but her hands catch his face in the same way his hold her. She guides his forehead down until it is touching hers.

"I remember this, too."

Does he feel trust and protection and safety while he's tangled in a spider's web?

Natalia needs to know.

She needs to _know_.

Because it's happened to her.

And she won't let it happen to him again.

* * *

 **Note:**

 **The mouse movie is _An American Tail._** **The other movie is _The Swan Princess_. Because I can't write Nat without ballet, and I can't write ballet without a reference to _Swan Lake_.**

 **(Psst: The Soldier's listening to "Mr Lonely" at the end there. In case you wanted the full effect.)**


	9. Chapter 9

Natalia inflates the Soldier with water, and they watch cartoons until they both fall asleep on opposite ends of the couch. Their bare toes are four centimeters apart. When she wakes up, it's because of Bing Crosby. The curtains are still drawn tight so it could be any time of day. The Soldier's sitting on the floor next to the coffee table; legs extended and feet still bare. He's cleaning a long-range rifle and humming along with the music.

It's a strange sight to see. It's almost like he's — well, he's not happy because he can't be. It's like he's content.

Natalia realizes she's no longer curled up on her end of the couch. She's stretched out along the length of it and there's an amazingly plush red blanket tucked lightly around her. Her hair nearly blends right into the color of the blanket. It's easy to carry on breathing and lying as if she's still asleep, so she does it and keeps watching the Soldier clean.

The humming stops and he's mouthing the words instead. Two songs later, she can actually hear him singing the words. He sings along to "The Best Things in Life are Free" as he picks up the reassembled rifle, looks through telescopic sight, pulls back the handle to unlock the bolt, and smiles mutely when a new round slides into the breech. The Soldier stops singing to praise the rifle in Russian, as if it's just done something impressive. The safety gets engaged — he never used to do that.

Natalia watches him reach into his bag and pull out a PB pistol. He's singing again and unscrewing the silencer from the Makarov. The magazine falls out into his hand; he inspects it and then pushes it back home. Then he glances back at her, does a double take when he sees her eyes are opened, and then he twitches his lips.

"Hello," he says.

She jerks her chin at him. "Hey."

The Soldier reaches across the table and picks up a mug. He holds it out to her.

It's more hot chocolate. She accepts it, gives her thanks, and drinks from it. Pinching the blanket with her free hand, Natalia says, "Where'd this come from?"

The Soldier turns away from her, hides his face.

It makes her smile. "Tell Seymour Butz I said thanks."

"OK."

They don't say anything. She drinks his hot chocolate for a little while and then puts it back on the table beside him. Sits up with her back against the armrest and knees bent up toward her chest. Pulls the blanket around her.

"You seem better," she says.

He nods. "I feel better." Pause. "I was wonder—uh. I, um." He puts the gun down and breathes deliberately through his nose. Looks at her for half a second and then back at his lap. Opens his mouth, closes it. Rolls his eyes across the ceiling. Coughs. Sighs. "I like the music."

Natalia chuckles. "What do you want to ask?"

He swallows and looks up at her a little sheepishly. "Uh. How many times have we met before?"

Oh.

"Twice before this mission."

The Soldier's brows draw down and he picks up his gun again. "I don't remember."

Natalia buries her fingers into the folds of the blanket. It's so _red_.

She says, "The first time we met, I was thirteen. You taught me and twenty-seven other girls how to escape from and defeat a larger assailant. You taught us how to fight with a partner."

He's running his thumb nail up and down the length of the silencer. "Did I hurt you? Did I hurt any of them?"

Natalia hums without meaning to make the sound. He looks up at her. There's something like alarm in his eyes. She shakes her head. "No. No, you never hurt any of us." A half-formed laugh slips out. "You, uh. You actually got in a lot of trouble for being too nice — gentle — you weren't as hard as you were supposed to be with us."

His eyebrows shoot up his forehead. Surprised or confused or both.

Natalia says, "The handlers at the Red Room said you went around acting like you had twenty-eight little sisters to take care of." She smiles until he raises his eyes back to her. "At the end of each day, you'd hold our faces, kiss the tops of our heads, and say Боюсь, что мне пора."

He looks down at his lap. His hair curtains off his expression, but Natalia can see the color rising in his cheeks.

"That can't have ended well," he says.

Another soft laugh. She shakes her head, "No, it didn't. But even when your handlers came back to check on you and they saw you smiling at us — you knew you were in so much trouble and so did we. But your handlers let you finish the lesson and they didn't stop you from saying good-bye to us." The smile slips a little. "Your handlers made us watch you get recalibrated in the chair."

His shoulders shiver.

"They wanted us to see how forgettable we were and that we could be wiped from all existence as easily as we were wiped from yours. You were punished for caring about us and we were punished for treating you like a human."

"I'm sorry," he says.

"Don't be sorry, Yakov. It was a good thing."

"But everyone was hurt."

She lets her head fall against the cushion. "Good things hurt just like bad things. Sometimes worse."

Those grey, colorless eyes are boring into her. " _Losing_ good things hurts just like bad things."

She counters, "Losing a good thing is a bad thing."

He blinks and looks away. She knows that's his way of expressing disagreement. He clears his throat and asks, "What was the second time? I mean, the second time we met."

The blanket is _so red_.

"It was a few years later. And it was — well, it was part of our 'graduation trials', you could say."

He looks confused. "What does that mean?"

She pulls her hand out of the red and gestures vaguely. "Sort of . . . simulations to test our abilities. If we're eligible to take the mantle of the Black Widow."

By the silence, Natalia knows that he's deciding whether or not he wants to hear the rest of it. After ninety-five seconds, he looks at her and nods his head.

"They brought all of us who were eligible to 'graduate' out to a gulag in Siberia. They used to keep German prisoners there after the end of the Second World War. We knew because of the bodies. The clothes we found rotting in the snow. Our handlers closed us in for four days and just told us to survive for as long as we could.

"On the fifth day, they brought you in. They told us that we would pass if we evaded capture for twenty-four hours. Or, if we worked together to overpower you, all of us would pass. If one of us overpowered you on our own, we would be free to leave the Red Room. Go wherever we wanted with the promise to never be pursued as long as we kept their secrets."

Natalia closes her eyes and feels the cold of that gulag biting at her from years gone by. She remembers the hollow ache in her belly after spending four days with inadequate food, water, shelter, and clothing.

"What happened?" the Soldier says.

Her eyes open and she looks at him. "None of us worked together to overpower you," she says bitterly. "Twenty-seven girls went in — one had died the year before. We heard a bunch of shots get fired and then . . . Four girls passed the test and another one got to go free."

"How'd she do it? How'd she overpower me?"

Shrug. "Two of us found you passed out in the snow. There were seven bullet holes in your guts. Personally, I don't think that was what put you down."

"Why not?"

"When your handlers revived you, you kept saying _don't do anything stupid until I get back_. Over and over. The four of us that you hadn't caught yet stood around watching them patch you up, and you'd look each of us in the eye and say that. Again and again. Whatever she did, she broke you out."

His throat shakes. "What was her name?"

Now Natalia smiles small but genuine. "Yelena. I haven't seen or heard from her since then. I hope she made it somewhere better."

She hopes that, and she is jealous that it hadn't been her who got to go free. Now Natalia must fight for that freedom the hard way. Must out-maneuver those who designed the game.

The Soldier turns around so that he's facing her, looks up at her.

"You're not going back. This mission — you never intended to go back."

Where did all the air go?

"No."

"You're going to run."

She blinks back wetness.

"Once you start running, you're never going to be able to stop."

"Who told you that?"

The Soldier shakes his head as if the question was ringing in his ears. "You want them to think you're dead. You want the Red Room to think you're dead. You want me to go back to them and tell them you're dead."

Natalia stares at his eyes like stones. She breathes in, breathes out. She breathes in, sheathed in red. Breathe in, breathe out. But she's still drowning.

* * *

 **Note:**

 **Боюсь, что мне пора = I'm afraid that I have to go**


	10. Chapter 10

"No," she says. "I don't want that."

And it's true. She _doesn't_ want that. Not that precisely. Not anymore.

"You did," the Soldier insists. He inclines his head at her. There's no accusation in his voice, though there should be. He's not angry. He just wants someone to tell him he's right.

Under the water, Natalia breathes in precious air. The drill, the straw girl, the spider trying to fit inside a human body.

"I did," she says.

Her head breaks the surface.

The Soldier looks down at his dissimilar hands. Looks back up. "I'll do it."

Another wave slams down on her. She splutters, flails. It's tossed her and turned her. Which way is up and which is down? Should she swim parallel to the shore? She could open her mouth and let it all out. She could evacuate her lungs and rest forever on the seafloor — shipwrecked.

She wants to. Since the moment it was taken, she's wanted to —

"No."

"I'm not sca—"

"You're not going back."

"You can't stop me."

" _You're not going back, Yakov_."

"Don't call me that," he says. There's teeth to the way he says it. "That's not my name."

Hot, white flash inside her — she has teeth of her own. "What is your name then?"

"My name is . . . my name — I'm," he says.

He says nothing.

Natalia says, "Don't tell me you'll go back until you tell me who you are. I won't be responsible for what happens."

She gets to her feet and sheds the red cocoon. There's a louder ache in her shoulder than before. For now, she refrains from stretching it. It's going to hurt, but she doesn't have time to treat it gently. She doesn't have time.

"Stay in the hotel." She heads for her bags and digs around.

"Where are you going?" he says. He's small and shy again. He's corrected.

"It's only a matter of time until someone catches up to us. I'm going to help us disappear."

He may be the ghost, but spiders know how to get into places they're not meant to be.

When she's become a regular Danish citizen, she stands at the door and stares at the Soldier. He's still on the floor with his weapons. Still barefoot. Still trying to pick up the remains of his house of cards. They'd said it sometimes takes a firm hand to deal with the Soldier. Natalia's not dealing with _just_ the Soldier anymore, but she's beginning to think a firm hand won't be enough. Whatever makes up his foundation, it's immovable.

"Eat," she says. "Drink."

The implication: _Don't fuck around with me right now, Soldat._

Then she's gone.

Natalia can't go walking these streets. Nadine Roman won't come to her — they've been together for so long that it feels like betrayal. Being Klara feels like bamboo shoots being shoved under her fingernails.

Who to be, who to be?

Three hours and visits to seven establishments later, Johanna Nielsen has seven bank accounts and is fully documented. Natalia doesn't plan to flash Johanna's paperwork unless absolutely necessary. The wound in her shoulder is what makes her get the papers. She must be prepared for anything. The wound might slow her down just enough to prevent her from getting to certain places the fast way.

Natalia enters a shop to find new clothes for herself and the Soldier. Where they're going, they'll need warm clothes. They'll need non-tactical gear, in the Soldier's case. She knows the best way to hide is to not hide at all. You must pretend that you're exactly where you want to be.

It helps to be somewhere no one wants to go, though.

Johanna is a practical woman who still appreciates style. When push comes to shove, she likes to be reasonable. She's reaching for a red and black plaid flannel when behind her she hears, "Wow. I'm impressed."

English. American.

Agent Barton.

Johanna turns around to stare the man in the face. Natalia bends Johanna's lips upward as if she's just run into an old friend. "It's great to see you."

He may be an agent, but Natalia can see the surprise on his face; he hadn't expected her to react like this. He should have — how did he think this would work when he confronted her in a crowded store? This is no place to whip out Bites and Glocks. There are innocents around for crying out loud.

Barton steps toward her. "I thought you'd be off your feet for a lot longer. Most people go down for a week at the least."

"Oh, well, you know me," she says with a vague wave of her hand. "Been around the block, haven't I?"

"That's what I hear." Another step and they're breathing the same air. "Why don't we go for a walk?"

Natalia immediately shines through Johanna's eyes — anger, suspicion, annoyance.

Agent Barton holds up his hands in surrender. As if that means he's unarmed. "No strings. Just to talk."

She shakes the flannel shirt in her hand; Johanna again. "I'm in the middle of something. Can you wait until I finish up here?"

He smirks at her. "Sure thing, Red."

Barton follows her around the fucking shop. She abandons the idea of getting the Soldier new clothes. Another time. Maybe when they're out of here. When she's done shopping, Natalia glares out of Johanna's eyes at Barton until he backs off while she pays.

Outside, he lets her choose which direction they walk. She goes toward the hotel and then turns down a street parallel to it. They walk along the water. It's windy and cold. It's almost as bad as the hotel room, where the Soldier has the air conditioner going in November. She reminder herself to ask him about it.

"So you got better fast," Barton says.

There's less space between them than there was between the Soldier and Nadine when they were fleeing the park they'd followed Oskar Rainer into. After they'd let go of each other.

"It still smarts," she says. Rolls her eyes at him. Is she Johanna or Natalia? Is there a difference? Different paint on the same house?

"Thanks for throwing me a bone," he says.

She squishes up her lips so she doesn't smile. "That what you want to talk about?"

Shakes his head. "Who's your accomplice?"

"I don't have accomplices — I work alone."

"That's not what I saw."

"You didn't see anything." Nothing but the blinding light of the Soldier's flashbang.

"I know you're not working alone."

Natalia says, "What do you want?"

Agent Barton sighs and takes a big step so that he's in front of her. She stops and stares up at him. His hands are held up again. Nonthreatening.

"If you give up your accomplice, we'll cut a deal."

Her eyebrow arches without her command. "Cut a deal?" It's so _American_.

"Tell us who it is, who it works for."

He refers to the Soldier as an it.

Barton goes on, "You're not going to evade us forever. We followed you here. It's only a matter of time."

"If you know so much about me, Agent Barton, then you know this isn't my first rodeo." She can talk American, too.

He grips her upper arms. The hair on the back of her neck rises. Her hands fly up and jab into the insides of Barton's elbows. They fold and she steps back out of his grip. Fire in her lungs, in her veins. She's ready to fight.

"Sorry — didn't mean anything," says Barton.

She takes a step back. Not here. She can't do this here.

"Wait!" he says. "Just listen, OK, Red?"

Her body's turned ninety degrees away, ready to leave. But her eyes stay on Barton. "What do you want?" she says.

"I have orders to kill you, alright?"

"Why are you telling me this? You're bad at your job."

He snorts. "Thanks." Pauses. "If you give up your accomplice and everything you know about who you work for, I can bring you in unharmed."

Unharmed? No. No, that's not what they want. Give up the Soldier? Definitely not. Then someone else will have him — have both of them. Same thing, different handlers.

"We can protect you from them," Barton says.

She can't understand why he's saying this. Why is he telling her these things? Natalia shakes her head viciously inside Johanna's consciousness. The waves are rising again. Her hand tightens around the shopping bag. She turns the other ninety degrees.

"I guess I'll see you around," she says.

He doesn't follow her. She goes to three more shops and buys more clothes, including some for the Soldier. She assumes he prefers practicality to style. If she gets things that are _too_ practical, he'll stand out worse than if he went around in full-on tactical gear. In the end, she buys a lot of flannel. Their new wardrobes are very similar. It makes her laugh.

She goes to two different hotels before she gets back to hers. Inside the room, the Soldier is sitting on the couch with his body leaning toward the television. Watching a movie. She's satisfied to see empty plates and a glass of water before him on the coffee table. Natalia sets the shopping bags down beside their luggage. Boils water and puts it in a mug. Brings it over to the couch and sits beside the Soldier.

"What are you watching?" she says. It's not cartoons.

He blinks and swallows but doesn't take his eyes off the screen. Doesn't speak.

After a few seconds of observation, she sees it's a war movie. An American one. He's so engrossed in it that Natalia lets him watch it in peace. She drinks her hot water and stretches her arm out where he can't see. The bags had gotten heavy after carrying them for so long.

She goes to the bathroom. Pulls off the dressing on her shoulder to get a better view of the wound. It's ugly, but it's not infected. It's clean and closed and healing as well as can be expected considering how new it is. She steams over the mirrors with the shower. Gets in and lets it warm her up. It's colder in this room than it is outside.

Some of the new clothes get put on when she leaves the shower. Back on the couch, she cocoons in the red, red blanket and watches the end of the movie with the Soldier: An old man is talking to a white cross in a cemetery while his family stands back and gives him some privacy. He wants to know that he's a good man, that he's earned his life. The last shot is that of an American flag waving in the wind. Yikes.

The Soldier coughs when the credits start to roll. Blinks and looks at her.

"Hello," he says. It's like a replay of the morning.

"Hey," she echoes. "Was it good?"

"What?"

"The movie."

He glances back at the screen. Shrugs. "It seemed — . . . It made my head itch on the inside. It made my head hurt."

Is another implosion on the horizon? Natalia hopes it waits until they're out of here and hidden better.

"Will you do something for me?" she says.

He nods.

The blanket falls away. "Will you redress my shoulder?"

Another nod.

He does it quickly, efficiently. Clinically. When he's done, she hides herself in the blanket again.

"May I ask you something?"

Nod.

"Why do you keep it so cold in here?"

He looks quickly at her. "I can change it. If it's uncomfortable I will—"

"No, no," she says. "It's fine. I'm just curious."

Attention back to his fingernails. "The cold keeps me calm. It's easier to think when I'm cold."

In that case, Natalia hopes it starts snowing.

The Soldier nods to the bags. "Where are we going?"

Good to hear that he's not still on the idea of going back to the Red Room. She'd been afraid that he'd get stuck on it. Insist on going back.

She smiles at him. "Örnsköldsvik."

* * *

 **Note:**

 **The Soldier's watching _Saving Private Ryan._**

 **Nat's aliases, Klara and Johanna, are shout outs to First Aid Kit. Their song "Shattered & Hollow" was one of the seeds that this mess you're reading grew out of. **

**I love you, Sweden. Hi-ho.**


	11. Chapter 11

For the record, the Soldier looks good in a pea coat.

Natalia's wearing one, too. Hers is green. Makes her look like she's celebrating St. Patrick's Day in the United States or something. The Soldier's is blue and he stares at himself in the mirror of their hotel while Natalia gets all their shit together. She didn't know he could be vain.

All their bags are packed. Old clothes were discarded in dumpsters around the hotel. She tossed a few of their weapons while she was at it — had to make room for the completely normal clothes they now had. And the snacks. Can't go anywhere without proper snacks.

"Time to go, Narcissus," she says.

The Soldier turns away from the mirror, burdens himself with all their bags, and waits for her to lead the way out of here.

They're going on the run but it's not wise to be in a hurry. A train takes them from Århus to Grenaa. It takes about an hour and a half. Natalia has to be Klara again to ward off anyone who wants to sit too close to them. From Grenaa, they board a ferry bound for Varberg. Here she has to get creative. Surprisingly, the Soldier proves to be very persuasive when dealing with the right kind of people.

Then it's another train to Stockholm. She lets the Soldier play with Klara's mp3 player. They end up listening to The Temptations for most of the trip. The Soldier makes strange faces every once in a while. Sometimes it looks like he has a stomachache and other times he looks ready to burst out laughing.

A bus takes them from Stockholm to Örnsköldsvik. It's uncomfortable. Both of them hate it. The Soldier shifts a lot. Natalia leans against his metal shoulder and holds his gloved hand. She doesn't know if she does this for herself or for him. It seems to take forever.

By the time they arrive in the cold, secluded log home Natalia had secured for them a little ways from the harbor, they're both irritated, hungry, and tired. Natalia's shoulder hurts. She changes. Puts on Johanna and goes into town to get them proper supplies. She makes the Soldier stay back. He pouts.

But a few hours later, she's back with real food. They're both fed and clean. The house has a sectional sofa in front of a big-ass television. They each stretch out on a leg of the sofa. Natalia finds a program where kids are singing for a table of mean judges. When that ends, she finds a channel for babies that's only sounds and no words. Both their eyelids droop. She makes sure it's cold in the house and falls asleep right there on the couch.

She wakes up in the red cocoon that she hadn't fallen asleep in. Again. Television is off. The Soldier's side of the sectional is vacant. Natalia goes to the kitchen and prepares herself some hot water. Her toes curl on the hardwood floor. Being cold all the time is going to be awful, but she's willing to endure it if the Soldier can keep it together. As water boils, she pulls on one of the flannel shirts and thick socks. They're striped, alternating two different shades of pink.

Blueberries, oatmeal, and a mug of hot water. She makes toast. Finds thick-cut bacon — she'd prefer a thinner cut but this is what they have. Fries it up. Cooks eggs in the rendered fat. She makes hash browns and prepares baked beans. Fries half a tomato.

It doesn't work: the smell doesn't draw out the Soldier from wherever he's gone off to. So she eats on her own. When she's done, she prepares a plate for him and the requisite hot chocolate. Natalia goes hunting.

He's not on the ground floor. Not in the lower level. Annoyed, she heads upstairs. She finds him in a room that looks like a small library. The walls are embedded with bookshelves. No windows, so it's really dim. Two armchairs are off to the side. There's an end table between them and a two-headed lamp peering over their shoulders. The Soldier has his back to her, standing in front of an ornate phonograph. It's new but meant to look old and impressive.

"Are you hungry?" she says. Her voice is quiet but it fills the space in the same way that a dim light illuminates an entire room just a little bit. "I brought you breakfast."

The Soldier clears his throat. "Thank you." He makes no move to turn.

She sets the plate and mug on one of the bookshelves. Turns back toward him.

"Did you sleep at all?"

"A little," he says while shaking his head.

"Everything alright?"

"Had a dream."

Her spider's legs twitch. It takes everything just to stand still. "A good dream?"

He shrugs.

"What happened? In the dream."

His metal hand is touching the phonograph. She wishes he would turn around.

"Things were blowing up," he says. "I was taking cover in a hole with someone else. The explosions stopped, and the person and I looked at each other. He laughed and said — "

"What did he say?"

Shrug. "Don't know. I woke up." He pauses.

 _One, two, three, four, five, six_.

The Soldier says, "He had blue eyes. In the dream. Blue eyes — and I woke up before he could say anything."

Now it's OK. Natalia takes a step into the room. She moves parallel to the Soldier instead of toward him. "You know," she says, "we can only dream about faces we've seen before."

"Yeah?"

"Yeah."

From here, she can see the Soldier's jaw working.

"When I woke up. Um, when I woke up, I felt sad. Like — I thought I — . . ." He gives up trying to articulate what he wants to say and shrugs.

Like he could smell food but couldn't taste it? Like he was looking at a picture that he wanted so badly to dive into and live in?

The Soldier clears his throat and says in a more confident voice, "You dance, don't you, Natalia?"

She stops in her advancement into the room. "Yes," she says.

He nods. "I think I used to dance."

"You did a little in the Red Room. With us." But she knows he's talking about _before_. She _knows_.

Natalia remembers hands on her sides, below her ribs. She remembers lifts and jumps and turning on her nail-less toes while his hands hovered around her. She remembers being tossed, firing three shots, and being caught in the basket of his arms. The way he did it, the right arm would make up for the cushion that the left lacked when he caught her — when he caught all of them. She remembers her legs tangled around his chest, his shoulders, his neck. She remembers swinging around his body and squeezing endless triggers. There was sparring: Her _en pointe_ , and him balanced on the very pads of his toes. She remembers _fouette_ turns that ended in roundhouse kicks to his face. She remembers seven girls armed with Tokarevs firing at him at the same time — he didn't take a single hit, turning and _dancing_ out of the trajectory of every single shot.

She remembers him teaching her and twenty-seven others how he did it.

 _Control, control, control._ An ironic thing for him to be teaching them.

They were all trained in ballet since the day they first came to the Red Room, but he taught them how to make that body control a weapon. The Winter Soldier dancing ballet wasn't nearly as funny when he dodged your every shot and snapped your neck.

"I remember," he says.

It's safe to move again but she doesn't.

Clears his throat again. "Can I show you?"

"Yes."

There's shifting. A record begins to spin. A soft scratching sound. The Soldier turns around to face her, and he looks human. He takes three steps and holds out his right hand to her while music starts; brassy and bold now that it's out of its time. Natalia takes the offered hand and steps into his hold.

The Soldier leads — but he doesn't move like the Soldier moves.

She's never danced like this. She's never let someone else lead. They sway and bounce, and it feels old like a necklace from your grandmother. Her skin touches his skin. Her hand holds his hand. The metal arm is around her waist and her hand rests around the back of his neck. His right holds her left. Sometimes it switches so that she clutches the metal palm and the flesh arm is around her. It changes as they swing around the room, stepping through decades. She hears big bands, sees long skirts and curled hairstyles. Jazz and Lindy Hop.

The Soldier unfurls her and she spins away from him. He pulls her back in. She spins until she slides into his left arm. In that single heartbeat, when she arrives back home, their eyes catch and there's a real person's cocky smile on the Soldier's lips: a perfect fit.

They have seconds on breakfast in the kitchen afterward.

* * *

 **Note:**

 **They're dancin' to** **"The Way You Look Tonight." Frank Sinatra's version because duh.**


	12. Chapter 12

A breathless scream jumps out of Natalia's mouth. Her throat shakes and her chin is quivering, wrinkling. Tears squeeze past her eyelids. Why won't her hands be still? Inside, her lungs shiver and the breath fights its way free. Through streaming eyes she sees that it has been two minutes and fifty-eight seconds since all of this started.

She hasn't cried without purpose for — she doesn't remember ever crying when it wasn't meant to manipulate a situation.

Three minutes and forty-two seconds have passed by the time she regains control of herself. Her breath still skips in her chest every five inhales, but she has the strength to control her hands, to push herself up off the forest floor. There are sticks and dead leaves in her hair. Dirt on her face that her tears turned to mud. Her coat is damp to the touch from the snow her body heat had melted around her.

Spiders aren't afraid to fall, not even after they do it a thousand times.

She's sitting on the ground in the woody area around their log home. Water is seeping into the seat of her pants. With gloved hands, she wipes the tears from her eyes as best she can. It probably smears the mud worse. Her face feels tight and swollen. Her eyelashes frozen. Natalia blows out a breath that makes her silken webs shiver.

She feels better.

She hadn't expected it to be so hard.

She hates herself for needing this.

No one to pull on her strings and manipulate her anymore. So she reaches out, picks up her fallen Glock 20, rolls to her feet, and continues to walk the perimeter. She thinks about what Agent Barton had told her in Århus. It was lies. Even if he hadn't meant to lie, he wasn't telling the truth.

A creeping, whimpering part of her wishes he could have been.

Natalia returns to the house and goes inside. She redoes all seven locking mechanism on the door. Anyone who found them wouldn't come in through the front door, but Natalia likes to think the locks provide them with some measure of peace of mind. Not a lot — not _enough_. But some. In the week since they arrived here, she's noticed that it makes the Soldier sleep a little bit deeper, if not longer.

They're not safe. They both know it. The locks won't stop those who search for them. If anything, the longer they go without any hostile contact, the more they feel stretched and the closer they creep toward true fear. Maybe the stress makes them more exhausted, and that's why the Soldier can find rest at half the struggle it used to take.

Up the waterspout she crawls and then the shower is raining down on her. She doesn't freeze herself and then force a thaw. She steams the mirrors slowly and reanimates her face. No sticks and leaves in her hair. No mud on her face. No evidence of weakness. No evidence of softening or whatever is happening to her. No evidence of a change, unlike the Soldier.

He'd asked her to cut his hair three days ago. She had. He'd stared at himself in the mirror after. She'd asked if he wanted her to get the blue coat. That broke the Soldier out of it. His cheeks flushed and he fled the room. A ghostly "thanks" lingered after he'd gone.

Natalia dresses herself in flannel and denim. She colors her eyelids with shades of brown. Disguises her eyelashes. Leaves her lips bare. Good enough.

She leaves the bathroom and goes up the stairs into the small library. It's where the Soldier likes to stay when he's not on watch. It's where they dance when their bodies itch for movement. Sometimes the Soldier dances her into the past. Sometimes Natalia demilitarizes his ballet technique and they drape the room in grace. It's where they spar when they want to hit harder than dancing allows.

When she steps into the room, he looks up from a book. He's sitting in one of the armchairs. There's a Beretta on the end table beside him.

Not to toot her own horn, but Natalia thinks she did an excellent job with his hair. Now, if he'd stop asking for goddamn Brylcreem, that would be great. Natalia thought they could do a lot better than _Brylcreem_ anyway.

"Wanna go into town?" she says.

He nods.

He's been asking to get out of the house and do a personal scan of the town. Maybe it'll make him feel better. Natalia's held off on letting him out in public because she knows it's a matter of time until Agent Barton & Co. pop up. She doesn't want them getting an eyeful of the Soldier. She really wishes she knew why she felt that way.

Natalia pulls on a hat that's so long that it hangs off the back of her head. It's supposed to be a style, she thinks. When the Soldier first saw her wearing it, he asked if she was expecting to grow a second head. Natalia let him get away with it because he'd just told a _joke_.

"Want a hat?" she says.

The Soldier shakes his head. He's doing up the buttons of his blue pea coat.

"How's your Swedish?"

He shrugs. "They always come back to me real easy."

The way he speaks changes so quickly, Natalia notices. She says, "Mine needs some work. I was thinking we try something new."

He looks up from his buttons. "What?"

"Let's play a game. We're obviously not Swedish. So let's be something else."

"Like what?"

She shrugs. "I was thinking Americans on a trip or something."

"Americans," he says.

"So we can just speak English. We both speak good English and so do Swedes."

The Soldier shrugs. "OK."

"My papers say I'm Johanna. You don't have any, but you can still be Yakov if you want."

He frowns at his buttons. Pulls a glove over his left hand. "Are there a lot of Americans named Yakov?"

Natalia shrugs. "I don't think so. The English equivalent is Jacob. Or sometimes James."

It makes him stare hard at his hands. "Jacob," he says, tests out how it tastes on his tongue. Lips spasm. "James." Eyes flick up to her and he smiles self-consciously. "I like Yakov better."

"We can say your name is Yakov Smirnoff and that your parents had a great sense of humor."

It makes him snort and almost smile with one side of his face.

Natalia slips one of her arms through one of his and steers them out of the house. "C'mon, Yasha. Let's get you some fresh air."

The air outside is a different kind of cold than the kind manufactured inside by the air conditioner. They go to a shop for hot chocolate first. For the first time, the Soldier orders for them. He gets tres leches hot chocolate. They pass it back and forth as they walk. It's too busy of a drink for her, but the Soldier guzzles it like he hasn't tasted anything for years.

In a shop, they get t-shirts with moose and wolves on them because they're funny. They waste money in a bakery because the Soldier's eyes went big as saucers when he caught the scent of it in the air. She'd suspected it, but Natalia is still amused to see proof of the Soldier's sweet tooth. He straight up asks for samples with the most innocent look on his face. The locals adore him. It helps that he buys everything that they _do_ give him a sample of. The locals also know how to run a business.

Natalia makes sure that they walk as much of the town as possible. It makes both of them feel better to walk through so much of the town and get to know it intimately. Makes their hearts slow down to see that there's nothing insidious lying in wait for them. Not yet.

They watch children skate on a frozen bit of water. They do it like it's just as easy as walking. As breathing. It's beautiful to watch. They sit on a bench with their packages and watch for a bit. The harbor is in the distance. It's quiet. There's not a lot of activity here anymore. It's why Natalia had picked this place for one of her safe houses. She'd been planning this exit from the Red Room for a long time now. It took so much time because making too many plans at once would ruin everything. They'd find out. She had to make arrangements piece by piece while they sent her out to collect blood.

 _Have to do it_ , she'd tell herself on those missions. _Have to do it until I don't._

Natalia doesn't know if it's all been worth it, but she can't deny that it feels satisfying to sit here with the Soldier.

A woman approaches them with a camera in her hands and says, "God eftermiddag. Jag är student. Får jag ta din bild för ett project?"

The Soldier smiles at her and Natalia says, "My hovercraft is full of eels."

"Oh," the woman says and laughs.

"We just got here," Natalia says. "Still learning, unfortunately."

"One language is never enough," the woman says with a smile.

Natalia feels the Soldier shrink away from the stranger minutely. He gravitates closer to her side by millimeters.

"I was just saying that I'm a student. I'm working on a project here." She lifts up the camera for them to see. "May I take your picture? It's a closed project; nothing will be made public."

"Sure," the Soldier says.

So the woman does. The shutter doesn't sound like a gunshot. It _doesn't_. Something feeds out of the bottom of the camera.

"Is that a Polaroid?" Natalia hears herself ask.

"It's just like the old instants," the woman says. She seems interested to be asked. Tells them that the image prints immediately and the memory card simultaneously saves the image for later. She only needs the digital image. She hands the square print to Natalia and the Soldier. She says, "Thank you for helping. You're such a lovely pair."

And then she's walking away and talking to an old couple that was tottering in their direction. Natalia tucks the print into her pocket. She catches the Soldier's eye. He nods to her and picks up all their bags.

"I'll see you at the house," he says.

"See you," she says.

The itsy bitsy spider stalks the lying woman.

The woman takes a lot of pictures and hands out the prints to the victims. Natalia stretches her many legs and whispers after her prey. They walk through parks and through a grocery store. The woman goes into an obnoxious apartment building. Natalia manages to toss a tracker at the woman's bag. It sticks and blinks red once. Then the woman and the bag are gone inside the security of the building.

The cool thing about spiders is that they can ride air currents up to the tops of tall buildings.

But first, Natalia needs to pick up a few things. She buys a backpack, a mobile phone, and a laptop. She puts the laptop in the backpack without opening it. The mobile she fires up right away and programs the tracker's data into it. The screen goes blank and then spits out a three-dimensional SONAR-like image of the apartment building. A spot on the ninth floor pulses.

The itsy bitsy spider goes up the apartment building's wall.

It's not easy to do because it's daylight (but it won't be for long — mid-Sweden in November and all that) and the building has giant windows with potential witnesses inside. She goes up and up to the eleventh floor. Goes in through the window of an empty apartment. Leaves the place untouched. Consults the phone: no bodies in the hallway outside the door. All the people seemed to be staying put in their cages. Not a good sign that all the rooms on the ninth floor appear to be vacant except for the one the pulse is coming from. Natalia goes out into the hallway and then down the stairs.

She enters the hallway on the ninth floor. The stairwell door closes at the same time that another door opens. It's the woman. She stops dead and stares at Natalia. They both spring into action at the same time.

Immediately, Natalia activates the tracker's pin. It explodes inside the bag. It tosses the woman down before she can take two steps away from Natalia. The spider crawls down the hallway and Bites the woman before she can recover. Maneuvers their two bodies until they're both inside the apartment. Natalia throws the body down and locks the door. Bites the woman again. Closes all the curtains and shades. Tosses down her backpack.

The woman has rolled to her feet by now and shifts onto her toes.

It's a spider. One hardly old enough to weave on her own.

They sent a _spiderling_ to get her. It's insulting.

She draws a knife. Natalia arches an eyebrow at it.

Really. It's insulting.

They tangle their webs. Natalia immediately has the upper hand. She sweeps the legs out from under the girl. Bites her ribs. Dodges spinning kicks. Catches a forearm and throws it back. Natalia _pirouettes_ and drives her heel into the woman — the _girl_ 's oblique. She folds over the side. Natalia turns, unravels her elbow into the girl's back. Tangles their feet and brings both of them to the floor.

The other struggles. There's no more technique or control. Wild struggle. Desperation.

Natalia's shoulder screams as loud as it can, but she can control it. She can ignore it until all of this has passed.

Drawing her bracelet garrote, Natalia pulls it around the girl's throat. The body below her goes limp. Natalia immediately removes the pressure and makes sure the girl still draws breath. Makes sure there's no mark that will linger. The evidence of a struggle is erased.

She gets up and finds the bathroom. Drags the body in there with her. She puts the other spider in the bathtub. In a first aid kit under the sink, she finds the standard drugs deployed with young spiders. Natalia gets the morphine. Fills a syringe with gloved hands and injects it into the girl's veins. Makes sure to leave the spent syringe and the bottle where the world can see.

Natalia takes the other spider's knife and puts it in the unconscious hand. She moves the girl's hand like a puppet master. Natalia makes the girl's hand cut her opposite wrist. She turns on the shower so it spits warm water. Stuffing the first aid kit, the hard drive of the girl's laptop, and the memory card from the stupid camera in her bag, Natalia turns on the stereo as loud as it will go and leaves out the window.

If the spider has decent neighbors, someone will find her. If the Red Room is serious, someone will find her too late.

Natalia goes back to the safe house. There's sizzling coming from inside. It smells like something is burning. Natalia's heart jumps into her throat as she runs for the kitchen. Had the young spider been a distraction? Something to keep Natalia busy why they recaptured the Soldier?

She slides on the hardwood. Her boots make a squelching sound. The Soldier is still there. No one is attacking him. He's standing there staring into the living room while something in a pan burns on the stove. She turns off the heat and puts the pan into the sink. Runs some water. Turns.

"Yakov?" she says. She's relieved but she's still not happy. He hasn't gotten like this. Nothing has made her so on edge since he tried to tell her what they did to his mouth.

He doesn't respond. Still staring off. She takes several measured steps toward him. She reaches a hand out and touches his cheek when she's close enough.

"Yasha?" she says. "We have to—"

"Him," the Soldier says.

"Who?"

He keeps staring into the living room. At the television. Natalia turns away and looks. The news is on. It's broadcasting 'breaking news.' Her hand drops off the Soldier's cheek and she walks into the living room to stare even closer. She can't remember how to read Swedish, but she doesn't need to in order to understand that a man's been found frozen inside the wreckage of a seventy-year old plane. Frozen, but alive.

She turns away from the screen and looks back at the Soldier. His mouth is hanging open a little. He finally looks away from the screen and at her.

"I-I think — I think I knew him."

* * *

 **Note:**

 **God eftermiddag. Jag är student. Får jag ta din bild för ett project? = Good afternoon. I'm a student. May I take your picture for a project?**


	13. Chapter 13

"How could you have—" Natalia's cut off by half the house exploding.

Their bodies are tossed like dolls. She groans and rolls over. Their log home is up in flames. Smoke invades her lungs and she coughs as she pushes herself up. It's impossible to see. So much smoke — blinding, suffocating.

"Yakov," she tries to say. She's not sure she succeeds.

Another bang. This one is smaller. Crashing. Boots. They have hostiles incoming.

Hands are on her. Pulling her up and away. All her brain can think about when she feels the contact is that the house is so hot and that it's not supposed to be that way because the Soldier can't think in the heat. _Then_ she registers the coolness of one of the hands on her. The Soldier has her.

"Natalia," he says. He doesn't sound like he's choking on smoke at all. He shakes her a little.

"Y-yes," she chokes.

"Natalia, fire."

Fire? Of course there's fire.

Oh.

Fire, like the verb. As in, _fire your weapon._

They're running. She's in his hold. Natalia grapples until she frees her Glock 20. She shoots out the window and they're through it. It's cold again. Her head clears at the same time as her lungs. The Soldier's running while he holds her.

Maybe he's on to something with the cold air.

Natalia readies her silk and swings around the Soldier's body so that she can shoot back into their burning home. Black silhouettes fall into the flames. They can't hear screaming over the crack of the flames. Shots are fired back at them, but they're mostly without aim.

Something _big_ blows up the ground around them. Sends them sprawling in the snow like the first blast in the house. Natalia tumbles from the Soldier's shoulders and rolls twice in the snow to be sure that nothing's broken. She's fine. She's _fine_. The Soldier's huffing a few meters away. She's up and yanking on his metal arm.

"Up, up," she says. "Get up. Time to get up."

He gets up slowly. They start to run again. But they're being followed. Their pursuers aren't on foot; it's some sort of ATV. Natalia swallows down bile, stops, turns, and aims the Glock at the tires. She hits two.

Then the Soldier's arm is around her waist, pulling her away from the scene. He runs at the ATV and attacks the men as they come out. It's hand-to-hand like she's never seen it before. The Soldier disarms the driver first. Breaks his wrist and then kicks the chest of a second attacker. He spins and drives his elbow into the face of a third. Buries his left fist into the face of the driver until brain matter falls into the snow. A fourth man gets a few shots off — Natalia hears the metallic _ting_ as the Soldier deflects them. But then that man's wrist is absolutely shredded. The gun's turned in the man's hand so it faces its handler. The Soldier makes the fourth man's trigger finger squeeze. A hole through the man's forehead but a mess at the back. The Soldier dodges the recovered second man's right hook and kick toward his knees. The third man is staggering around.

Natalia sees a spark. Cattle prods. Why has she only been standing here? Her feet carry her into the battle. She takes the second man as the third goes at the Soldier with the cattle prod. Natalia jumps and turns while airborne, catches the man's neck between her thighs. She throws him to the ground and frees herself before she crashes with him. The man scrambles to get up. Natalia meets his rising head with the sole of her boot. It drives him back down. She kicks in the side of his head until there's a crunch.

The third man with the cattle prod falls to the ground then. Even in the shimmering light of their burning safe house, Natalia can see the bruises around the man's neck. The odd angle is obvious, but the bruises strike her as more grotesque.

The Soldier's breathing hard. He spits on the pile of bodies. Picks up a handful of snow and rubs it on the gore staining his left fist. In the vehicle, he yanks out the steering column and throws it in the snow. Then he pulls out a black case. Throws that in the snow, too, but with more care.

"Check it," he says.

Natalia kneels down and opens it. It's full of weapons. Explosives. A small arsenal. She looks up, sure that her eyes are glittering. The Soldier's pulling out another box. He picks up a grenade, pulls the pin, flips off the spoon, and throws it at another vehicle that's grumbling in their direction. It explodes in the air — the vehicle is too far off for the delay. He picks up another and pulls the pin again. He keeps the lever depressed and waits for the vehicle to come a little closer. Then he throws it.

It lands in the ATV and blows the thing apart.

"Let's go," he says.

Scooping up the black case, he begins running again. Natalia grabs the cattle prod and one of the discarded guns. She runs in his wake, shooting at the ATVs that materialize out of nowhere and attempt to pursue them.

Their voices echo after them, yelling in Russian. They're saying phrases Natalia can recognize as the commands Petrenko had taught her to control the Soldier. Either he can't hear them or he's made major strides over his programming in the past few weeks.

Natalia increases her pace until she's even with the Soldier.

"Follow me," she says. "I planned for something like this."

So he falls back and lets her lead. Natalia's brain can't make any sounds apart from feline screeching as her legs sink deep into the snow, slowing her down. She'd just checked on the escape plans earlier today. Before she'd had a complete breakdown in the forest. It was so much farther away now. They're moving so much slower. The shots the Soldier fires off at their pursuers sound so much louder.

Both of their breaths sound harsh and _loud loud loud._

New footsteps. She hears the Soldier stop — _bang._ No new footsteps. The Soldier follows her again.

An engine. She keeps running. The Soldier stops.

 _Bang._

 _Bang._

The Soldier follows.

The snow explodes to their left. The Soldier's hand is on her arm and he's shoving her right. Her legs don't stop. Can't stop.

 _Bang —_ it's not the Soldier.

He gasps.

 _Bangbangbang._

They're running in slow motion. The snow has gotten deep.

Clanking and the Soldier's breath getting caught high in his chest. An explosion. He's thrown a grenade.

"How far?" she hears him ask.

"Close," she says.

 _Bang_. All the way into the woods. Especially once the trees close in around them and make sounds echo up and down.

Empty clicks. The Soldier growls and whips the gun away.

 _Bang_.

The Soldier yelps. He stops running.

Natalia can see the jet hiding in the trees. So close.

 _Bang_.

The Soldier's cry climbs up the trees and Natalia's spine. She hears a body slump into the snow.

It's so close. Escape. The potential for freedom. A chance to be something else. An opportunity to find out who Natalia really is.

 _Bang._

She slows down. She can see the jet.

No sound. Then boots in the snow.

" _Soldat._ "

A snarl. Natalia stops and turns halfway so she sees the Soldier launch himself at their pursuer.

" _Laika."_

The Soldier screams as if his voice is being ripped from him. Natalia can't tell, but she thinks there's a word he's saying. The echo is too powerful, the volume too loud. She can't be sure.

The man fires again. The Soldier grunts. Launches himself at the attacker again, still screaming agony. Claws with nails and metal. The man is panicking. Being overcome. Desperation taints the air.

Natalia takes a step in the right direction.

Two sounds:

" _Sputnik_."

And _bang_.

For a moment, the world is still. Then gravity and life get turned back on. Bodies fall to the snow. Natalia lowers her Glock 20 and sprints away from the jet. Back toward the Soldier. She falls to her knees. Picks up his head and places it in her lap.

"Yakov," she breathes. "Yasha, dearest, hey."

His eyes aren't quite closed, but they're not open either. He's breathing in short pants. The snow's so bloody. He has so many holes. So much red on her hands. Natalia can't be responsible for this.

"Yasha, please talk to me."

His lips quiver. "M-m-my—my n-name. I-I-I r-re-remember my" — a sharp intake of breath — "name."

She grabs fistfuls of his shirt. He isn't wearing a coat. He isn't even wearing shoes. "Get up, Yasha. Please. The jet's so close. C'mon. We're almost there."

His head rolls back and forth in her lap. "My name."

She's losing him. She's _losing_ him.

"Yasha, no."

". . . tell you my name."

Her voice echoes: _Don't tell me you'll go back until you tell me who you are._

"No. You're not going back. Get up, Yasha. We're almost there. We'll find somewhere to go. I have safe places for us to go." Natalia pulls on his shirt. "Come on, Yasha."

"M'name's Bucky."

Her cheeks flinch. Tighten. Her lips don't know whether to bend up or grimace. The snow is so red and she's sitting in it. She's been sitting in red her whole life. That sort of thing doesn't go away. Natalia _is_ red. Perhaps it's time she stops acting like she's not.

She holds his face and kisses the top of his head.

Her lips decide to curve upward by a few degrees. "I'm not going to leave you behind, Bucky."

He struggles against something very heavy. She can see it. It makes her smile a little bit wider.

"I'm going to get you out of here, Bucky," she says. He shifts at the sound of her voice — at the sound of his name. "Bucky," she says just to see him fight harder. "You're Bucky and I'm Natalia."

Spiders can lift many times their own weight. Natalia digs her hands in the fabric of his shirt and pulls. She struggles to her feet and drags his immense body toward the jet. It's so close. So close. She can see. Her breath labors. The Soldi— _Bucky_ 's body leaves a wide, red trail in the snow.

Cold tears are building on her eyelids. As if they remember coming here earlier and breaking free. Natalia lets a strangled gasp go free. He's so heavy. The snow's so deep. They're both stained forever red.

But the jet's _so close._

Distant engines whine. If she wanted to look, Natalia knows she would still be able to see the burning house. It must be swarming with the team sent to retrieve the Sol—Bucky. Sent to retrieve Bucky.

They can't have him. Natalia yanks hard to get them moving faster. They can't have him. The air is thick and she can hardly breathe it; she pulls hard on his shirt. They can't have him. He has a name now. And the things they did to him — to his mouth. A muted, frustrated sound comes out from between her teeth. He's so heavy, but they can't have him.

So, so close.

Her feet sink into deep snow. One of her ankles bends the wrong way. She cries out and collapses. This isn't her. This isn't a spider. Natalia sits up the Sol— _Bucky_. She sits him up, hooks her arms under his, and drags him again. It hurts her shoulder and her ankles and her throat. He leaves that long red trail in the snow. Her air puffs out in white clouds.

"Won't leave you behind," she promises. "I won't leave you behind. I'll get you out of here. No matter what. We're getting out. I have safe spaces for us. You're Bucky and I'm Natalia."

Finally, _finally_ , she's there. She's made it to the jet. Natalia slams her fist, her red, red fist at the button that opens the bay door. The jet is of that asshole American, Stark's, design. It's not commercially available. Natalia had to do a lot of awful things to come into possession of it.

It's impossible to drag the Soldier up an incline. She goes until he's mostly on the bay door. Then she bends his limp legs until he's lying in a heap on it. From the inside, she closes the door. It goes up and brings the Sol— _Bucky_ inside with it. Leaves him horizontal and still on the floor, pooling red.

She made it this far. She brought him this far. Natalia sits in the pilot's seat, her face still streaming. The two of them made it this far and they have to keep going.

* * *

 **Note:**

 **The "Laika" trigger is meant to incapacitate the Soldier while keeping him cognizant. If that is an _actual_ trigger in any universe, it's coincidental; I spent zero minutes doing research. In this story, "Sputnik" isn't a one-time deal. **

**This bologna-story is its own AU. I'm not trying to fit it into a canon-shaped box or explicitly connect it to any previous works (though there are definitely call-backs to some). I'm trying to leave a lot up to the reader's interpretation here.**

 **Hi-ho and cheers.**


	14. Chapter 14

**Warning: Graphically inaccurate and vague descriptions of first aid/wound care.**

* * *

Natalia programs the jet to fly southwest to Scotland. It sounds like a good idea, though she can't say why. Then she goes back to the S— _Bucky_ and tries to plug the weeping holes. The jet's equipped with a lot of first aid supplies, but it doesn't have everything she needs. Blood, for one thing.

So Natalia must do her best to fix this without making him worse. Kneeling in his blood, she cuts away his clothes. Six holes. There were more shots, but she figures he got his metal arm up in time to block them. The blood gurgles out of his navel. The back of his right arm is painted in so much red. She's grateful that none of the shots are too high on his chest. The flesh from his left clavicle to his lower-middle ribs on the right side is clear of any holes. Probably internal injuries, though. She hopes his stomach hasn't been perforated. Or his intestines.

Natalia bites her lip. Not good. But there's a chance both his lungs and heart weren't hit — but what the fuck does she know? She's not trained for this.

The holes on his arm and the back of his left leg are easy to deal with. Nothing too bad. She doesn't even have to think about a tourniquet.

She stops a lot of his bleeding. He doesn't make a sound. Not even when she throws her entire body weight on top of him, pressing down as hard as she can. It makes even more red seep out of him, like a bloody sponge. Natalia hopes his silence is a product of " _Sputnik_ " and not of all the red.

He needs blood. Natalia doesn't know his blood type, doesn't know if it matters for someone like him. She's type O. If it was desperate — . . . There's all the supplies needed for a transfusion, but he needs more than she can give. Natalia's no doctor, but she can see that it's true. Even if she gave him everything she could, it would leave her weak. It would leave _both_ of them defenseless. There won't be enough time for either of them to recover before someone else is attacking them.

The jet's almost to their destination before Natalia gets the Soldier (she has to stop thinking of him like that) to stop bleeding. It looks like it has rained coagulation factor packets around them. She doesn't know if or (more likely) when he'll go into shock. She starts an IV for him. Maybe fluids will stave off the inevitable.

She plans.

She fumbles for that stupid phone she'd bought before she went into the other spider's apartment. She searches until she finds something suitable. Natalia finds suitable in the form of one Mitali Suma. It will require her to leave the Soldier. She doesn't want to leave him. For so many reasons. He could die if she leaves him. He could die if she doesn't. Natalia weighs the chances and then steers the jet downward.

She sets the jet down in a pathetic copse of trees. Sets up security. If motion is detected within a two-mile (fucking Imperial system) radius, Natalia will be alerted. She sets a bug and a com device on the ground next to the—Bucky. Pairs the crude monitors that she's attached to him to the phone. If he wakes, she'll hear it. If he does _anything_ , she'll hear it. Natalia scrawls a note describing everything, but she doubts that he'll be in any mind to read it, if he wakes up at all.

Everything is done in a hurry. She has to get away so that she can come back. Natalia empties the backpack, slings it on her back, and makes a run for it. As soon as she sees signs of life, she steals a car and drives to a blood bank. She steals several units of blood and doesn't feel bad about it. Not one bit. Natalia grabs a few more odds and ends just to be safe. In a different town, she steals more crap from a hospital.

Then she drives into the town of Erskine, to the house of Mitali Suma. The jet had some shitty Smith & Wesson pistols on board. Natalia draws one out and enters the house. It's relatively big. She settles in the kitchen with the pistol on the counter. She sits next to the gun and lets her feet dangle downward. Impatience eats at her. Her eyes rove around the house but her mind is focused entirely on the com device in her ear and the phone in her pocket, anticipating alerts.

After six long, long minutes, Natalia hears a sound via the com device. It sounds like shifting. Then a low moan. Like that of a dying animal. A horse whose leg's been broken. It's the Sol—Bucky. Her heart beats hard. She listens to him shifting and trying to speak. Something gurgles in his throat.

"…eve?" she hears over the link. Another low moan. He says it again a little bit louder. A little bit more desperately. "—eve!"

Natalia listens to the broken man try to cry. Her legs itch to jump to action. It will all be for naught if she leaves now, though. Stay the course. She must stay the course.

Just then, lights pass through the curtains. Finally, the woman is home. Natalia picks up the Smith & Wesson and slides to her feet. Mitali Suma enters half a minute later. When the light flicks on, she gasps.

"Who are you? What are you doing in my house?"

Mitali Suma is shorter than Natalia. She's wider. Her hair is black and thick. She's a very beautiful woman, in an earthy sort of way. A natural sort of way. The kind that is looked over and seldom celebrated. Like clear fields of green grass. Like undisturbed snow.

Natalia levels the pistol at Suma. "You're coming with me."

"Please put the gun down! My children—"

"You have no children."

Suma snaps her mouth closed. Looks annoyed. Then her eyes lighten. "Natasha."

"Hello, Dr. Suma."

They step towards one another. Natalia covers a larger distance and embraces little Mitali Suma hard. Breathes her antiseptic smell in.

"What do you want from me?" Suma says.

On the com in her ear, Natalia hears the Sol— _Bucky_ mutter deliriously, "Steve. Fuck. . . . —eve, please."

Natalia squeezes the grip of the pistol hard. "My friend needs your help."

Mitali Suma eyes Natalia hard. Something unreadable about her. "What's wrong with your friend? How did you find me?"

"He's been shot." She ignores the other question.

Suma is beautiful like a flood.

Natalia looks this force of nature in the eye and says with as much earnestness as she can while still maintaining control of the situation, "You're the best trauma surgeon I know. And you owe me one."

"Don't flatter me while pointing a gun at my face," Suma says. "Take me to your friend."

This isn't what she expects. But she goes with it. Tells the doctor to bring anything she can — they won't be going to a hospital. As they head to the car, Natalia notices a shadow shift in the backyard. She spends some time shaking their possible tail before she drives back toward the jet. Suma doesn't say anything. Not about the situation and not about the bag of stolen blood in the backseat. She doesn't say anything when they walk into the woods or when they enter a jet that has only ever been used for military purposes.

Suma _does_ say something when she sees the—Bucky lying naked on the floor of the jet. Says something about his metal arm. She says, "Combat vet, I take it."

Natalia says, "Something like that."

The Soldier—Bucky had gone quiet before they left Suma's house. He's quiet and white and cold again when they come back.

"He needs a hospital," Suma says.

"No," says Natalia.

"There are four bullet holes in his torso. He needs a hospital."

"I said no." They stare hard at each other. Natalia lifts the Smith & Wesson and grounds out between her teeth, "Help him."

Suma shakes her head and turns toward the—Bucky. "When he dies, it's because of you."

Together they get him up off the floor and onto a sort of table that emerges from the side of the jet. Suma takes out her tools; Natalia leaves the bag of stolen blood and filched supplies near her. The doctor works, and Natalia sits in the pilot's seat, staring out the window. The security sensors sweep for intruders.

After too many hours, Suma comes up behind her seat and says, "You should bring him to a hospital."

Natalia shakes her head and stares out the window. "Can't."

"Why not?" She sounds ready to slap Natalia.

"They'll find him."

"He needs a hospital. I did the best I could for him."

Natalia shakes her head. "Are all the bullets out?"

"Yes. But he has internal damage. I dealt with those organs as best I could, but he needs a proper place to recover. He needs to be observed."

"I'll observe him."

"He needs a doctor. And I'm not staying here."

Natalia looks at the doctor. "Then leave. Tell anyone about us and I'll be back. I won't be as kind as I was today." _Especially if he dies._

Suma sighs exasperatedly. "Bring him to my house."

"What?"

"Bring him to my house. It's better than this."

Natalia can't see how that's true. "Your house isn't secure. Not safe."

"This place isn't safe for him either."

"It has first aid supplies. Did you give him oxygen?"

"Yes. His lungs are struggling. He'll need more blood than what you took."

"Then I'll give him some of mine."

"Do you really believe—"

"It's just a couple of gunshot wounds," Natalia says over Suma. Harsh. Natalia doesn't add that the Soldier has clearly had worse. "Thank you for what you've done. He'll be fine."

"And what will you do if he starts to hemorrhage internally?"

"I'll deal with it."

"This is ridiculous. You will kill him doing this. Come to mine."

"Is your house a hospital?" she says. "Then it's no better than here. And here is secure."

Suma stares hard at her. Looks furious. "Let me out."

Natalia does. Gives her the key to the car she stole. Threatens her. Suma leaves. Natalia locks up the jet once she makes it back inside.

Suma had covered _Bucky_ with a blanket. Natalia knows that it's bad if he starts shivering. There are a lot of fluids hanging above him. She sees that one is an antibiotic and another is a painkiller. She snorts; how quickly will his metabolism blow through that? Some of the stolen blood is still dripping into him. There's a mask over his face providing oxygen. She doesn't check how much is left in the tank.

Natalia sits on a seat across from the table he's lying on. She stares and tries as hard as she can not to think. Hours could have passed. Maybe only minutes. There was no way of knowing.

Indeterminable amount of time later: The Soldier shifts, and her head snaps up. She gets to her feet and steps to his side. Touches his hair. His head falls into the touch. Brows draw down.

"—eve?" he says. Sounds like it comes out over sandpaper. The mask muffles it.

"Yasha?" she breathes. She corrects herself: "Bucky?"

"Steve?" he croaks.

An internal part of Natalia prickles and grounds its teeth together. It doesn't like this. _Bucky_ is wrong. A part of Natalia doesn't like _Bucky_.

Why is he asking for Steve? Who is Steve? A handler? Some monster that buried a sense of Stockholm syndrome so deep into the Soldier's bones that the poor man asked from him even while in the depths of delirium?

"Who's Steve?" she says. Her fingers card through his hair just once.

His face contracts like he's annoyed by the question. "He's — Steve's my CO."

She's never heard of a handler that was referred to as a CO. She says, "Is Steve good to you, Yasha? Did he make your body not listen? Did he put things in you?"

The So— _Bucky_ doesn't like the question. His eyes close hard and he grimaces. But he doesn't try to leave from under her hand. She runs her fingers through his hair again to make up from the distress the question caused.

"I want to talk to Steve," he whines.

"Steve's not here."

All the tension leaves his body. Eyelids flutter but don't open. "Must be pretty bad."

"What?"

"Must be bad . . . if you're not lettin' Steve in to see me."

"Yasha, where — What do you think happened?"

His breath hitches. He squirms. She wants to tell him not to move or he'll upset the delicate threads holding his insides together.

"Guys'll never let me forget it," he says. The mask shifts and he makes a face that says he really wants to rip it off.

"Forget what?"

"Fallin' off the side of a damn train and down a fuckin' mountain."

"Yasha, you were shot."

Contraction again. He makes a strange sound. Stroking his hair doesn't calm him this time.

"When's Steve coming? Can you get Steve?"

Petrenko told her that they'd never had to use " _Sputnik_ " in the field. They were very proud. Natalia doesn't think this was supposed to be the result. It could be the drugs. It could be the blood loss. But she doesn't think so. The trigger did something the Soldier's handlers hadn't intended.

Natalia's brain jumps and she makes a connection. Could Steve be the frozen man? She doesn't remember what the television had said back in Sweden, but Steve sounds like the right name. The Soldier— _Bucky_ knew Steve, the frozen man. " _Sputnik_ " shut down the Soldier, but could it have perhaps also reset him? At the very least, did it upset the programming? Cause a glitch?

It sounds like too far of a reach. There's blood loss, drugs, and so much else — it's impossible to tell.

"Can you get Steve?" he says again.

"He's not here." Her nails brush against his scalp.

"When's he coming back?" He sounds distressed. "He's not mad at me, is he?"

"No, Yasha, he's not upset with you." Natalia's head spins, planning. "Hush, now. Rest. I'll go get Steve for you if you sleep now."

Natalia thinks it's time to go see Oskar Rainer again.

 _Bee-deep_ , says an alarm.

Intruder.

* * *

 **Note:**

 **I'm leaving it up to the reader to decide if this version of BuckyNat is platonic or (potentially) romantic. Hurrah for ambiguity!**


	15. Chapter 15

Natalia goes for the Oh Shit Bag she'd hidden on the jet when she first acquired it. No shitty Smith & Wesson when there are intruders. She pulls out a Beretta just like the one the Soldier left in Sweden.

"What's going on?" th—Bucky says. He's trying to roll onto his side and prop himself up. Not a chance in hell that'll happen.

Natalia digs through her Oh Shit Bag with one hand and places the other on an uninjured part of his chest. "Don't move," she says.

"What's that noise?" He hisses and stops trying to move. "Fuck."

"Don't move," she says again.

Seeing that some of the fluid bags are empty, Natalia pulls the lines and tosses them away. No more blood. His body will have to take care of the rest. Hopefully all that stolen red hasn't been leaking in his abdomen, pooling inside.

"Stay down. Rest. I'll be right outside."

The alarms are still chirping. Natalia exits through the bay door and locks it up when she's outside. The Soldier was still making noises of protest when the door latched closed. She makes it eleven steps before an arrow flies past her shoulder and glances off the jet with a muffled thud.

A voice calls through the trees, "It's me! Barton! I'm coming to you! Don't shoot me somewhere important!"

It takes a lot of restraint and several controlled breaths through the nose for Natalia to refrain from shooting up the sparse forest. Her grip on the Beretta tightens and she sweeps around herself in a semicircle. Agent Barton's footsteps reach her ears; Natalia stops sweeping and holds the pistol steady in his direction. No other sounds. He's alone.

He emerges into the dim light with his hands up. She sees a quiver and a bow slung across his back. He smiles and says, "I come in peace, Red."

This guy. The gun doesn't waver. "What now?"

"You blow up a house in Sweden and fly away in a military jet, and you didn't think anyone would notice?"

Her face stays impassive. She doesn't give anything away. If he wants to think that _she_ blew up the house, then it's better that way. There's too much unknown when it comes to Agent Barton and his boss, Hill.

"Are you here to ask me to surrender again?"

Barton lowers his hands and shakes his head. "Nah. Got a tip that you were in need of some aid."

"Suma."

He smiles and nods. "Mitali's great, isn't she? A little blunt and rough around the edges. But she's great, huh?"

Natalia stares at him. Lowers her gun.

Barton continues with a little less confidence, "I'm a little surprised you're still here. She said she gave you eight hours to make a run for it before coming to me. And you look just fine, so I'm thinking maybe it's that nonexistent accomplice of yours that needs the help."

"I don't need help."

He sighs and steps closer. He plucks a little device connected to a wire off the collar of his jacket. Crushes it in his fist. "Look, I'm not chasing you because I want to. The people I work for . . . they're good guys but they're not exactly _nice_ guys. They're kind of twisting my arm here."

She arches an eyebrow. Prepares to bring the gun up because he takes another step toward her.

"They've got my dog, alright?"

"They have your _dog_?"

"Don't look at me like that." He pulls a mobile phone out of his pocket and swipes at the screen. Turning it around, he holds it out toward her. A picture of a yellow dog smiles back at her. Its left eye is closed and there's a pizza box between the dog's front paws. "His name's Lucky."

Natalia doesn't know what to say, so she just stares. They have his dog. His _dog_.

Barton puts the phone away. "Like I said, they're good guys. The people I work for, I mean. But they're dicks. I don't _think_ they'd kill my dog, but, you know, I really don't want to take a gamble with his life. Means a lot to me."

She thinks of the way Petrenko stroked the Soldier's face before he made her practice disciplining the Soldier. The affection the handler had for the beast on the end of its leash. It's sick to think of now. Now that she knows what they did to him.

"So why don't you kill me and get your dog back?" she says.

Barton looks at her like she has just suggested he drown a baby rabbit.

"I'm not going to shoot you. Well, not again. I'm not gonna _kill_ you."

"Why not?"

"Jesus, is talking about murder as normal to you as talking about the weather is to everyone else?"

 _Yes_.

She doesn't say it because she can tell from his face that Agent Barton has recognized the truth of it a second after the words left his mouth.

"I may not be a Boy Scout, but I have _some_ morals," he says.

Natalia feels like she's been stabbed. Inside, she shakes and crumbles. Inside, something yearns so hard it _hurts_.

"I'm not a good guy," she whispers.

Agent Barton looks at her strangely. "You're not a bad guy, either," he says. Soft.

Waves are gathering above her, preparing to pull her down and down. She'll never see the surface again.

"It's not your fault, what you've done," he says. "It's not your fault."

Natalia's grip on the Beretta loosens and she takes half a step back. Away from Agent Barton.

"You don't have to be what they made you into," he says.

The waves are so high. Her chest might burst from the anticipation.

"You have orders to kill me," her lips say.

Agent Barton shrugs. "Fuck 'em. They took my dog. Shouldn't have done that if they wanted my full cooperation." He takes a step toward her, heedless of her consequent step back. "This is my call."

Natalia swallows despite her dry mouth. Her hand feels heavy with the Beretta in it. Her ankle hurts from twisting it in the snow. Her shoulder still hurts from the arrow and the poison — and from dragging the S—Bucky.

"My name's Clint, by the way," he says. He holds out his hand.

She licks her lips. The waves foam and finally they're falling on her head. Water invading her lungs. Pulling her down, up, left, right, wrong — pulling her apart. Everything's a swirl in front of her. It's better to keep her eyes closed, but she doesn't. There's a way out of this, she knows. She doesn't have to sink to the seafloor and live as the wreckage of something that used to float above the water.

Natalia reaches for a lifeline: "Natasha."

His grip is sturdy. Their hands shake once.

"It's good to meet you, Tasha," he says.

But she's not out of the water yet. Turning, she unlocks the jet and opens the bay door. She feels Agent Clint Barton following her. Thankfully, he keeps his distance. He follows her into the jet. The door closes behind them.

"What sort of ghetto hospital is this?" he jokes. He quiets when they approach the table and sees the metal arm stuck to a man's body.

Bucky's awake and still attempting to get up. Not enough control to do much more than rock a few degrees back and forth. Natalia goes to his side and runs one hand through his hair. He calms down in little steps and tries to see her through his two-ton lashes. Her other hand rests in the crook of his right arm, feeling the slow and steady pulse.

"Steve?" he asks.

Natalia shakes her head. "Not yet, dearest."

"Holy shit," Barton breathes. He edges closer. His eyes are wide, his eyebrows nearly merging with his hairline. Barton looks from Natalia to the Soldier. Then back again. He looks stunned. "Your accomplice is _Bucky Barnes_?"

She stares into Barton's eyes and says, "I call him Yakov."

The implication: _I don't know who the fuck Bucky Barnes is supposed to be_.

"Jesus," says Barton. "First Captain America and now this!"

Natalia doesn't know what to say. She's trying to catch her breath after the waves. Confusion.

Bucky shifts under her hand. Tries to roll again. He barely rolls five degrees, but it makes him hiss and fall still. "Fuck, ow," he breathes.

Barton leans over him and says, "Hey, uh, Sergeant Barnes? Um, Bucky?"

The Soldier's eyes still won't open and focus. He blinks in Barton's direction, but his eyelids still won't stay up. The distress is palpable. Natalia runs her thumb over his eyebrow until some of the tension dissipates.

"Who's there?" he says.

"My, uh, my name is Clint Barton. I'm here to help."

"Do you know where Steve is? Can I talk to him?"

Barton laughs softly and glances up at Natalia, asking for permission or some kind of consent. She inclines her head.

He puts a hand on the Soldier's metal shoulder. "I think that can be arranged, man."


	16. Chapter 16

Barton doesn't call his boss Hill. That's a blessing, Natalia thinks. Instead, he programs the jet for Glasgow, and it feels like it takes zero minutes to complete the trip. Bucky drops off all at once when they take off, like someone's flipped a switch. Natalia figures it's the drugs. She hopes it's the drugs and lack of proper blood.

The jet is taken down in a strange little complex. Private. There aren't a lot of lights or people. Natalia still doesn't trust it. She arms herself with as many of the guns in the Oh Shit Bag as she can carry inconspicuously. Checks that her Widows Bites are fully charged.

The jet's towed from a landing pad to the inside of the complex. The bay doors open and Mitali fucking Suma waits from them outside with a gurney. She smirks at Natalia. Natalia stares stonily back at her. Suma and Barton gingerly shift the Sol—Bucky onto the gurney. Natalia follows them as they head down long corridors with lights that are only half-lit (the Oh Shit Bag secure on her back). It feels like a race. Comedic. Suma runs with the gurney as if she's trying to get th—Bucky away from Natalia without blatantly doing so. And Natalia's running after her with a stubborn set to her mouth.

Suma disappears into an operating theatre. Barton's behind Natalia and he guides her to a bay where they can watch the doctor work from behind a glass wall. There are five others in the threatre with Suma. They're covered in papery scrubs and masks.

"She did it on purpose," Natalia says after an hour of watching them play around inside the— _Bucky's_ abdomen.

"Huh?" says Barton. He's slumped in a chair half asleep. Natalia's been standing two centimeters away from the glass.

"Suma only did enough to hold him over," she says to the glass. Barton's reflection blinks at her off to the side. "She didn't try to properly treat him at all in the jet."

"Guess it's a good thing you let me help," he says. There's something mocking or playful in his voice.

Natalia cringes internally.

"When's she coming?" she says.

"Who?"

"Your boss. You told her you got me to surrender, haven't you?" Natalia faces Barton and repeats her statement to him. She forgot about his hearing aids. Maybe it helps him to see her lips move. She doesn't know how bad it is for him.

"Oh, no. I haven't said anything to Maria yet. Kind of want to savor this for myself, you know? They just found Captain America, I'm sure you've heard. And a day later, I get to be the one who finds _Bucky fucking Barnes_."

She frowns. "Captain America was a sort of mascot, right? In the Second World War?"

Barton makes a strange face. "A _mascot_? What did they teach you in Soviet assassin school?"

It's her turn to make a face. She walks over and sits beside Agent Barton. Angles her body toward him so he can see her face and lips better.

Is it rude to ask about the hearing aids?

"Tell me," she says. Glances back through the window at the Soldier. Yakov. Her Yasha.

Barton sits up a little straighter. "Well, to be fair, yeah, Captain America started out as a mascot. Kind of. He was a character invented to help sell war bonds. USO took him on tour." At her blank look, Barton says, "The USO provided entertainment for soldiers."

"Hm," she says.

"When he was touring in Italy, Captain America went AWOL to go get that guy" — here Agent Barton points animatedly at the window and the exposed man beyond — "out of a POW camp. The brass gave the captain a team afterwards to go after these nutsy Nazi scientists." He shrugs.

"So those two knew each other?" she says. It bothers her that the—Bucky was a soldier before he was _the_ Soldier.

Barton nods. "Oh, yeah. According to the history books, they were thick as thieves since they were in short pants. Then they kicked ass in the war. Kids have been playing at being Cap and Bucky since 1945."

She looks away from Barton and back at the window. She doesn't like it. Hates it, even.

"So how'd you find him? I mean, how the hell is he alive?" Barton says.

She doesn't move. Thinks. Says, "Why is it a surprise he's alive?"

"It's been nearly seventy years since he fell off a train in the Alps. Everyone thinks he's dead. What, did he get frozen, too?"

Natalia runs her fingers over her collarbones. She hums. "Yes."

"What?" Barton laughs. He doesn't believe her.

She flicks her head toward Barton. "He's like me. Only they froze him between missions."

He looks stunned. A face so expressive is a weakness.

"He thought he was back in the war," she says. She thinks she's trying to hurt Barton, but she can't be sure. And she doesn't know why. "When he woke up in the jet. Before you turned up."

"What, like he thought you had rescued him from the train?"

She shrugs. "Maybe he was reliving his first moments after his captors found him. Before he knew they were captors and not friends." Blinks. "Or maybe he was delirious. Maybe it was a flashback."

"Shit."

"His mind's broken," she says. Nods to the window. "When he wakes up, he'll be violent if he can."

"Uh."

"Do you think an America soldier becomes an assassin with a red star on his metal arm because he _volunteers_ for it?"

Mostly, Natalia wonders how all of this got away from her so quickly. This mission wasn't supposed to go like this. The escape from the Red Room wasn't supposed to be like _this_. How had all of this ballooned away from her? She was steel bones and control. How had this gotten so out of hand? So fucking _messy_.

Hours later, they're done messing with the Soldier. He's full of tubes. Looks like an octopus. Like he's a limp marionette. Like he's caught in a web. Natalia's eaten because Barton kept pestering her. She hounded the staff until they let her in the Soldier's recovery room with full access to the records they made on him. She reads up on every drug they've given him and continue to give him. She sees what type of sterilizer they used on his skin, what size needles.

She sits beside him and squeezes a Beretta in her left hand.

Barton's boss will surely be here soon. She's not ready to surrender. Her mind howls; storms threaten the safety she's obtained via Agent Barton. She needs to get to Oskar Rainer. She _has_ to. She needs to know. But th—Bucky is in no shape to come with her. If she's honest, she doesn't want to have to worry about him when there's work to be done.

Natalia could sneak away now. She could swing on her silk and be gone. Could dive off of Barton's faux safety and back into the water. She won't be taken in by another agency and used. She is red, but she'll use it on her own terms. No one else gets to give her missions anymore. That was the whole point of leaving the Red Room. Natalia has little qualms about the killing she's done since she could walk and talk. No, killing doesn't bother her. Not having a choice about it _does_.

A spider should call its own shots. Choose who it bites. No one tells a spider who to catch in its web.

Hand clenches hard around the grip of the pistol. She'll come back for him. He's in the right place. These people have his Steve.

Natalia closes her eyes. Pushes herself out of her chair. Swings up the Oh Shit Bag and strides across the room. She's half a meter from the door when there's shifting on the bed.

"Natalia?"

She pauses because she can't stop herself. No control when that voice reaches her. She hopes even though she never wanted to.

"Yes?"

"What's happened?"

Her heart beats. Soars. She feels light. She turns to face the man lying on the bed. The man who had been still for so many hours.

"What's your name?" she says.

He frowns. Tries to push himself upright. Stops. Lies still. "What?"

Natalia repeats the question.

"Yakov," he says. "How'd we get here? Last I knew — Are we back with them? How'd we leave the trees—?"

If she jumped back into the sea, would he come with her?

"I got you out. Got us out."

He looks down at himself. A tired eyebrow arches. "I should have been better."

Natalia goes back to stand at his side. Stares at his grey eyes, lost of all color. She holsters the Beretta, takes his face between her hands, and kisses his forehead.

"You did well, Yasha."

When she leans back, one corner of his mouth is pulled back. Looks stupid. Tired.

"Can you get me out of all this?" He eyes all the tubes nervously. The surrounding monitors register his distress clearly.

She smirks at him and clamps off everything except the saline drip. "In a bit," she says when he stares pointedly at the remaining line. She elaborates, "No magic injection to set you right."

"Understood."

He lies still. Looks around, eyes always falling back on her every fifteen seconds. The monitors remain upset.

"When can we leave?" he asks.

She thinks. They'll have to see. Barton's boss will be arriving, if she's not here already. What's the best course?

"Sleep off the rest of the drugs," she says. "We'll make a move when you're less high."

"OK."

Twenty minutes later, he's not sleeping. Won't even close his eyes. Looks at Natalia with a guilty expression. She sighs in exasperation.

"Scoot," she says.

He inches over with painful slowness. She climbs into the web with him. Lays the Oh Shit Bag on their ankles. He lifts his metal arm (laboriously) and she lies on her side in that hollow space. Her head on his shoulder. His arm around her. They're a hard, defensive collection of limbs. The illusion of safety conjured by the lack of space between them. An example of desperate symbiosis. She loosens the Beretta and holds it in her hand so it rests like an anchor on the Soldier's chest. Her finger on the trigger guard. She could get a shot off in less than a second.

"I have more," she says.

He looks from the gun to her face. That's it: He's the Soldier. No mention of trains or mountains. No asking after Steve. It's _her_ name he called first. No more Bucky Barnes; that man's gone beneath the surface again. Disappeared now that the danger has passed.

"When you wake up, we'll get out of here."

He closes his eyes.

He's her Yasha again.


	17. Chapter 17

**Note:**

 **It's not explicitly mentioned here, but in this universe, Steve's older than Bucky (born 1919 and 1922, respectively). That makes Bucky 23 at the time of his presumed death and Steve 26. This was done mostly because I've only ever written Bucky as the older one, or I made their age difference negligible. I'm putting Nat at 20 or 21 and Clint at 28.**

* * *

The Soldier sleeps heavy. It's like he's dead. Feeling a little bit of concern that she'd never admit to, Natalia unclamps a few of the drips. Not the painkillers, though. Sorry, Soldier. She checks the nasal cannula. His left arm is heavy to maneuver without him conscious, but she climbs out of it easy enough. He stays dead.

Natalia falls back in the chair beside his bed and draws open the Oh Shit Bag. All the guns go back inside except for the Beretta. She finds a SIG-Sauer near the bottom. Places it on the bed with the Soldier in the space where her body used to be. He likes SIGs best. She had put everything that had been in the backpack from Örnsköldsvik into the Oh Shit Bag before she'd gone for Suma. The other spider's hard drive is in there. So is the laptop.

Natalia finds the mobile's charger and plugs one end into the phone and the other into an outlet. Then she opens a web browser and searches "Bucky Barnes." She reads about the life of a man she's never heard of. Learns that his name isn't Bucky, but actually James Buchanan Barnes. She can see where the name Bucky was derived, but she thinks it's a bit of a stretch.

Natalia swallows hard and thinks, _Yakov._ He'd chosen it for himself. He's always been Yakov, when given the option.

Bucky Barnes's life is available for the world to look up whenever they please:

He had a mother and a father and three little sisters. He had no children of his own. Was never married. Had two maternal aunts and one maternal uncle. One paternal aunt. He dropped out of college three weeks into a full scholarship. Among his three sisters, Bucky Barnes has six nieces and nephews, several great-nieces and great-nephews. They were all born after his presumed death. Two of the sisters still live.

The third sister has a strange story; it's always mentioned at the end of the articles about her brother. She never married; she traveled the world and wrote award-winning journalism pieces from the Eastern Bloc. She was famous for the glimpses beyond the Iron Curtain that she shared with the west. She had one son who grew up in the custody of the oldest sister . The third sister disappeared on assignment in Yugoslavia. It was big news when her body was sent back to the United States. The third sister is the subject of many documentaries and conspiracy theories even to this day.

Much like Bucky Barnes is, Natalia comes to find.

There are memorials of him in eight cities in the United States, one in Great Britain, and one in France. In most of these, he is featured alongside six other men. They're collectively known as the Howling Commandos.

Ridiculous.

After reading five on-line biographies of James Barnes, Natalia clicks through a few images. It's definitely the Soldier. All the articles agree that Bucky Barnes was virtually inseparable from Captain Steven Grant Rogers, and the images prove it. There are hardly any surviving images of Sergeant James Buchanan Barnes that do not also feature his captain. Even the ones from childhood feature a shrunken, bony boy with floppy hair alongside the dark-haired Irish kid. So strange to see the Soldier as a child. There's a hungry, starved look about him, but it's hard to see when he stands next to the child Rogers.

Next she searches "Steven Rogers," and learns that he is indeed Captain America. There are a lot of articles about him in light of the recent discovery. He preferred to be called Steve. Was born on the fourth of July. He went from tiny human to giant soldier thanks to a serum that remains classified to this day. It made him tall and strong and all-around _enhanced_.

Natalia eyes the Soldier over the top of the mobile.

Rogers wasn't the only one.

She finds it odd that a lot of the articles about Bucky Barnes are told in terms of Steve Rogers. As if the captain was the focal point of Barnes's existence. He existed only as a supporting character to Rogers's life. In the articles about Rogers, Natalia finds, the reverse isn't true. Barnes was merely another moon orbiting Rogers's Jupiter.

Or so the articles make it seem.

She searches "Clint Barton" and, as expected, finds nothing. Same thing with "Maria Hill." She searches her location and it spits back nothing useful. The house burning in Sweden is reported as a scheduled demolition. Right.

She searches "Natasha Romanoff" and "Nadine Roman" and "Natalie Rushman" and "Laura Matthers" and "Natsuka Shostakova" and "Klara Alexandrova" and and and.

Nothing. Nothing, nothing, nothing.

A few minutes later, she tosses the phone down and holds her face in her hands. The water wants her back. She hates Barton's safety. Tears threaten, but Natalia is stronger than emotion.

She shouldn't have looked any of that up.

She wishes she could search "Natalia Romanova" and find out who she's supposed to be.

The door opens and she's steel and bones again.

"Hey, Tasha." It's Barton.

She looks up but doesn't stand. "Hey."

He points to his chest. "Clint."

"Hey, Clint," she says. Her lips are slack, like they want to smile but her cheeks refuse to carry out the action.

He steps into the room. Parallel. Not forward, not toward the Soldier. "Can I sit?"

She shrugs.

"How's he doing?"

Natalia gives him a look. "You mean you haven't been watching this whole time?"

He sits and sighs casually. "The cameras did the weirdest thing when you came in."

She looks away from him. Hides a belated smile. She says, "You going to be doing the interrogation?"

"Who said anything about an interrogation?"

"I surrendered, didn't I?"

Barton tosses a small ball between his hands. "I thought I was just offering aid to a new friend and an American icon."

"Then when's your boss coming?"

"Maria? You're the one who keeps bringing her up. I never said anything about Maria." He catches her eye and winks. Looks back at the ball he's juggling. "My report might get lost, what with this whole Captain America thing they're dealing with back home."

Agent Clint Barton is a contradiction. She gives him an open look, something she hardly ever does.

He shrugs at the ball in his hands. "Just wanna give you options." The ball gets caught. He leans forward, elbows on knees. "I got you here while you were under duress. I told you I'm offering aid. Maria doesn't need to know."

She's heard things like this. Natalia's heart shivers in her chest. She presses her knees together. "What do you _want_ from me?"

Barton leans back. "This isn't an interrogation, but . . . I've got a few questions about your accomplice."

"I don't know anything."

"Didn't you say he's like you?"

She shakes her head. Feels off-balance. "Yes. But. I mean. He's not the Red Room's. Doesn't work for them."

Barton looks surprised to hear it. Something in his eyes looks heavy. "So who's he work for?"

Natalia shrugs. "Never asked. He came in a frozen box. They thaw him out, shock him, and give him a mission."

"Shock him?"

Natalia mimes a crown over her head. "Electroshock. Make him forget. They called it 'wiping.'" She doesn't mention the ten words and programming. All the triggers and how they corrected his behavior. If Barton knew, he'd take the Soldier away — whoever Barton works for would take advantage of the knowledge. No one can have her Yasha anymore.

"So they — whoever had him — what, brainwashed him?"

That's as good of a word as any. She doesn't respond.

"He doesn't remember anything?" Barton says.

Natalia shrugs. "The longer he's out of stasis, the more he remembers." Shrugs again. "That's what it seems like."

He raises his eyebrows and blinks for a long time. "Let me get this straight. Bucky Barnes fell off a train in '45. The world thinks he's dead." Barton glances at her here, but she gives no response. She hadn't known this part of the story until today. He continues, "But he survives and someone finds him and saves his life. Turns him into an assassin, _maybe_ against his will. Based on the cool arm decal, he must have ended up with the Soviets sometime. They freeze him to preserve him between missions."

Natalia shrugs. She really doesn't know.

Barton looks frustrated. "If I asked him when he wakes up, would he tell me?"

Natalia says, "Maybe."

Silence for a long time. Eventually, she says, "Are there any clothes around here for him?"

Barton startles and skips off with the promise to return with something for the Soldier. He comes back with new clothes for her, too. There's a washroom in the Soldier's room. Natalia makes good use of it by steaming up the mirrors. As she undresses though, she finds in the pocket of the green pea coat she's been wearing all this time the photograph the other spider had taken of Natalia and the Soldier in Örnsköldsvik. The colors are a little washed out. The white border has faint rust-colored stains on it.

Natalia holds it as the steam presses on her skin. Two lost people inside the white confines of a photograph. Lost, but they look back her with muted happiness. Wasn't more than two days ago. She already feels different. Feels like she's betrayed one of those two mute smilers. The photograph gets preserved between the folds of her clothes as she sheds her skin beneath artificial rain. Then it slides into the Oh Shit Bag: supplies necessary for survival.

Barton's left a blanket and pillow on her chair. There's a tray of food on a wheeled table.

Natalia eats and sleeps in the chair. Wakes up to the Soldier moaning while half-asleep. She wakes him up all the way. Helps him dress; it takes a long time. He doesn't look good when he's anything except completely horizontal. He has a hard time sitting up and grips her bad shoulder hard when he tries to stop himself from collapsing forward. An accident, a reflex; he apologizes until his lungs can't keep up with the demand.

"Sure could use one of those injections now, huh?" she says to make him stop.

He tries to smile. She guides him back down, fully dressed. He drapes his right hand over his eyes.

"OK?" she says. "Want the painkillers back?"

"No," he says. "It's just — head hurts."

"I don't think you hit your head on anything." She replays everything in her head since Örnsköldsvik.

"Feels like the concussion after something big explodes. I don't know." The hand drops away. He won't look at her. "Before the house was attacked, I. Uh, I don't remember — something, like, came loose in my head. That man they found in the ice." Wince. "Have they said anything more about it? The news."

"I'll look," she says. She opens the browser on the mobile and pulls up the results for "Steven Rogers" again. She clicks on the most recent article and asks the Soldier if he'd like her to read it aloud. He says yes.

When she finishes, he says, "I used to know that name. Are there pictures?"

Her hand locks. She breaks the bones and hands the phone over to the Soldier. He stares at the screen for a long time. Even once it goes dead and black. All at once, he tosses it back at her and says, "Thanks. When do we get out of here?"

Perfect timing: A siren starts wailing. The lights go dark and spooky, red and white lights flashing. An automated voice tells them that the facility has been breached and that everyone should evacuate the building. Natalia swings the Oh Shit Bag onto her back. Grabs the boots Barton left and begins shoving them onto the Soldier's feet as he labors to push himself up.

The door bursts open. Immediately, both Natalia and the Soldier are pointing their Beretta and SIG-Sauer, respectively, at the doorway.

"Woah," says Barton. "Here."

He tosses something small to Natalia. She catches it: three keys on a loop.

"Garage is down two stories, follow the grey." Both of them are frozen as Barton heads back for the door. "Go," he says, "they're coming for you both."

Then he's gone. Natalia whirls on the Soldier. He's working on the laces of his last boot. White skin going whiter.

"Do you trust me?" she says. Does she trust herself?

He looks in her eyes. Hesitates, but not for the reason that would break her. "Yes."

She pulls a small box out of a side pocket of the Oh Shit Bag. Opens it and pulls out a syringe of epinephrine. He doesn't flinch when she administers it. She hopes it's enough. She hopes it's not too much.

She gets him on his feet. He's heavy and leans on her a lot for those first few steps. But then he's taking more of his own weight. Gripping their pistols, they leave. Natalia leads. No one intercepts them as they head for a staircase. The Soldier struggles on the stairs; they should have looked for an elevator. Even as Natalia thinks it, she knows that she never would have gone in such a small, enclosed, _vulnerable_ space. There are shouts in the staircase that echo, but no one crosses them. They're all very high above or deep below.

Life's not perfect, and there's a shootout in the garage. The two of them walk right into it. They're the Soldier's people who are attacking here. Natalia figures the spiders will come down from above. The Soldier fires rapidly, but with remarkable control at the attackers. Barton's people, for their part, don't turn around or seem surprised. Stupid for the Solider to fire. Draw attention to himself.

Natalia tugs him along; he keeps firing. The shots go off so fast, but the bodies always drop after a single shot. She only fires once or twice as she presses the alarm button on the keyring Barton gave her, searching for their getaway car. She finds it and, luckily, it's not on the wrong side of the battle. Which means they'll have to drive through the Soldier's people to get out. Natalia's already making plans for that.

Passenger-side door open, Natalia shoves the Soldier inside. It's lucky his balance is compromised. He falls right into the seat. She drops the Oh Shit Bag in his lap.

"Get the smoke grenade," she says. Closes the door. Takes the driver's side. Starts the car. Backs out. Rolls down both of their windows.

The Soldier holds the grenade in one hand and the SIG-Sauer in the other. Natalia holds the Beretta out the window, slams down the accelerator, and blares the horn. All of this at the same time. Barton's men scatter out of the way. The Soldier fires until they're close enough; he whips the grenade. Big flash and then smoke is everywhere, making their eyes water. The men fire blindly. Natalia runs over a few bodies. She hopes they don't leave big dents. They'll have to find a new car if this one is full of bullet holes and dents that are the shape of human bodies.

They reach street level — the streets are mostly empty, thankfully — when a bullet pierces their back windscreen. The Soldier leans out the window to look behind them, ducking a shot aimed for his face.

"Got a tail," he says.

Natalia rolls her eyes. Great. Car chase through Glasgow.

* * *

 **Note:**

 **We're winding down. Thanks for reading! Hi-ho.**


	18. Chapter 18

"Turn around," she says.

The Soldier does as she says; he pulls himself back inside the car and faces forward.

"Seatbelt."

It clicks into place.

"Window up."

He holds down the button until the glass slides home.

Natalia catches the Soldier's eye briefly and smiles. "Don't throw up."

He holds his breath and flares his nostrils. She shifts over three lanes of traffic and makes a great demand of the engine. Wind whistles through the hole in the back windscreen. The rear view mirror gives Natalia a clear view of a black SUV pursuing them. Maneuvering their car might have been easier if the car had manual transmission, Natalia reflects. Who the hell buys automatic, besides Americans?

In any case, she slams down the brake for two seconds before releasing it. Swings the wheel right and depresses the accelerator again. They're going the wrong way up a one-way street. The rear view mirror tells her the SUV overshot the turn by a few meters. That's the idea. Bigger the _anything_ , the less control it has during movement. Spiders are small, but they make up for any deficiency in strength with speed.

She swings them out of the one-way street just in time to miss a car headed the right way down the path. It blares its horn and swerves to avoid the SUV. There's a distant crunching sound; she has no time to see what happened. She doesn't care because the SUV is still pursuing them. They'll try to get another shot off, so she makes sure not to stay on a straight path for too long. There are a lot of hard turns that make the brakes and engine squeal. Her body is pushed hard to either side when she whips the car through turns with radii too small for even high-performing vehicles.

After a U-turn through four lanes of traffic (a leisurely turn compared to all the ones they previously made), Natalia glances at the Soldier. Not looking great.

"Remember not to throw up," she says lightly, shifting them into a new lane and pumping the accelerator.

His hands convulse around the Oh Shit Bag. Licks his lips. He's sweating and pale. The adrenaline didn't last long. Eyes close tight for a long second. "Trying not to," he says.

"How's the headache?" It's easy to sound casual. In her arsenal of false persons, Natalia was once a girl who couldn't be fazed by anything. A girl who never paid any goddamn attention to her surroundings, always bumping into things and tripping over her own feet. It's easy to find this person inside Natalia and use her voice to keep the Soldier calm as they zigzag through Glasgow.

"Worse," he says.

"What I gave you can act like a vasoconstrictor — had to increase your blood pressure. Headaches are pretty common side effects." She smiles and hits the brake a little more slowly this time. The wheel spins and her foot transfers to the accelerator. "At least it was enough to get you on your feet and out of there without passing out, huh?"

He grunts and stares straight ahead. Hands clench and unclench. "Jittery," he says.

"It'll go away soon." Shift around a slow-moving van.

"Feel like this when they wake me up sometimes."

"All dead people get epinephrine," she says casually. A last-ditch effort to save the doomed. "Maybe it helped get your heart back up to speed while you thawed out."

"Don't like it."

Her reply is interrupted by a shot piercing their back window again.

"Fucking rude," she mutters to herself. She takes them over a median, through a red light, and further east.

It's only two more rough turns before the fading SUV disappears altogether. It only disappears because it becomes surrounded by more black SUVs that look just like it except for the garish lights flashing on them. A spot light shines down on the scene from a jet hovering above.

Agent Barton is a contradiction and a conundrum.

She takes them to a car park. Moves the two of them into one of the waiting vehicles. The Soldier is slow and leans on her again. She could give him some of the drugs in the Oh Shit Bag's first aid kit that would up his heart rate and blood pressure. But there's no immediate danger here, and he'd said that he didn't like how it made him feel. She remembers him saying how they used to inject him with something before they touched him. (It's happened to her.) Natalia doesn't want to dredge up those feelings. Would probably send him into a panic attack.

So she has him lie down in the backseat of the stolen car. In the car Barton had given them, Natalia finds a duffle bag packed to tearing. She transfers it into the new car; it's really heavy. With one of the keys on the ring Barton gave her, she scratches the paint on the side of the original getaway car. Kicks in the tail lights. Dents the bonnet. Knocks off one of the side-view mirrors. Unscrews the plates and puts them in a dumpster.

Natalia hops into the driver's seat of the new car. Turns to make eye contact with the Soldier. "Alright?"

"Yeah," he says, voice hoarse.

"Check out that bag. Inventory," she says as she starts up the car. It has manual transmission; she smiles to herself. Backs out and takes them onto the roadway. She hears zippers from the backseat as the Soldier digs through Barton's bag.

"Weapons," says the Soldier. "Mostly pistols. A lot of extra magazines, clips. Clothes." A huff of breath that could be laugh. "MREs. Canteens: five of 'em. Trackers, deactivated. Seven knives. Two blankets. Nine pairs of socks. Aid kit. Mobile phone: three of 'em. Bath towel. Soap. Shampoo. Toothbrushes: four of 'em. One tube of toothpaste. Spare shoelaces. Flashlight. Lighter. Three stun grenades. Credit cards. Cash, a lot of it. And a picture of a dog."

"A what?"

The Soldier's hand reaches between the front seats and holds out a small rectangle of glossy paper. Natalia takes it. It's a picture of Barton's dog, the left eye closed and floppy. There's an arrow in the dog's mouth, a dirty tennis ball on the end in place of an arrowhead. A series of numbers on the back.

"Cute," she says sardonically.

In the back, the Soldier unfolds one of the blankets and drapes it over himself. He uses some of the clothes from the bag as a pillow. Eyes droopy.

"Tired?"

"Head still hurts."

"Want anything?"

"No."

"Sure?"

"Yes. Just feel like I'm forgetting something important."

Natalia laughs truly.

He smiles sleepily. "You know what I mean."

She does: He knows he's forgotten remembering his name.

She could tell him. She probably _should_ tell him. He should get to go home and be with his Steve. He should get to be Bucky Barnes again and be with his family — his living family who surely must love and miss him. Back to a country that mourned him and built bronze and marble statues of him.

Natalia shouldn't keep him. She's doing all of this to flee the Red Room, to find Natalia. Put herself back together. Make choices about the red she spills. Natalia wants more than anything to be free, to be _someone_ again. She can't want that while simultaneously denying the Soldier the same things. What right has she to withhold him from himself?

Her knuckles are white around the steering wheel. Spiders don't keep things caught in their webs. They consume them, or they escape.

"Where're we going?" he says.

She looks at him in the rear view mirror. "We're going to finish our mission."

"Huh?"

"Cologne. I'm going to talk to Oskar Rainer again."

"Why?"

"To finish the mission."

"You want to know who he's selling the Red Room's intelligence to?"

"Yes."

"What are you going to do then?"

"Make a choice." She swallows and lightens her voice. "Hey, why don't you crack open one of those canteens? You have a lot of fluids you need to replace."

She hears the seal breaking on one of the canteens. Hears him drink slow and small amounts.

"Ugh," he says involuntarily.

"What?"

"Feels cold inside."

Natalia huffs and puts them on the M8. After a bit, it's onto the M74.

The Soldier says, "Is there any music? I think it might help to have something to focus on."

Natalia switches on the radio and clicks around until she finds something he might like. It's not that easy to do, seeing how everything he's liked so far is fifty years old. But she's lucky and finds an oldies station playing things that are just old enough. A song sways and asks them to join in. It's like their first ride on a train together, when they were Klara and someone's Asset.

Music from before Natalia's time and after Bucky Barnes's chase them down the United Kingdom. The Soldier keeps saying "Steve Rogers" under his breath as if it will knock down a wall in his head. He puts an emphasis on different parts of the name and says it backwards sometimes. Says "Captain America" but doesn't seem to make any headway doing that either. After nearly an hour of this, he curses in Russian, English, German, and something else — Finnish? He rubs his temples, drinks from the canteen, and pouts.

"OK back there?" she says. Doesn't know why.

Grunt. "Just bangin' my head against a wall, that's all."

"The order not to throw up still stands."

"I won't throw up. Might punch out the window though."

"Please don't. We're trying to be inconspicuous." Metal fingers dig hard into his forehead. Natalia slaps her hand around in the backseat blindly to get him to stop. "Don't do that."

"There's something in here. That man in the ice means something, I just can't remember what."

She looks out at the pavement disappearing beneath their wheels. "I'm sure it'll come to you," she says.

Cash earns them a private flight to Paris. The Soldier doesn't handle the flight well. They lie low in the city for two nights while he gets used to being vertical. Feeling a little strange the second night, Natalia wastes some time filling one of the phones in the bag from Barton with pirated music. It gives her a chance to use the laptop she'd bought in Örnsköldsvik. She plays songs for the Soldier, and he says whether or not he likes them. (He likes nearly all of them. Has a thing for doo-wop.)

They drink hot chocolate, watch cartoons, and listen to old music. Natalia fixes the other spider's hard drive to the laptop and has a look around. Goes through mounds of data in between song selections. The spider had been in town for four days. She'd been in Denmark before then but had the wrong city. According to records Natalia finds, she was supposed to check up on them after the fight in Cologne. Wasn't until they made it to Sweden that the Red Room realized that Natalia was making a break for it, Asset in tow. Natalia learns that the people who had the Soldier were called HYDRA. The same people Bucky Barnes and his Steve were supposed to have eliminated in their war.

She clears the hard drive. Break it open and digs out the magnetic disk within. Hits it with the grip of her Beretta until it's deformed and dented. Natalia tosses it in the garbage three floors up from their hotel room.

From Paris, they take a train to Luxembourg. Then another small, private flight to Sarajevo. A stolen car to a city outside Prague. Flight to Brussels. Bus to Bonn. Car to Cologne.

Natalia's everyone. She's everyone she's ever been. Buying tickets and talking to the people around them. Sometimes Klara secures them privacy by doing what she does best: talking like she has no manners. Or Nadine smiles sweetly but sternly and gets the pilot to stop looking at them. Natalie flirts and teases favors from others. Natsuka helps them go unnoticed; she's so grey. She's a kaleidoscope of people, always shifting. Always more than she appears. In reality, she's less. False.

(But maybe there's a little piece of Natalia inside all of them. Maybe she can collect them all and put them together to form something true.)

Perhaps it's genius or perhaps it's incredibly stupid — Natalia checks them into the same hotel that they'd first stayed at. They're both exhausted. The Soldier very nearly collapses. Luckily, he's standing by one of the beds. He groans and holds his head in his hands, lying face down. Natalia feels filled with sludge. But she makes herself climb onto the bed and coax the Soldier's hands off of his head. The metal one comes away with a few strands of hair stuck between the plates.

She sighs. Curls up beside him. Falls asleep. There's work tomorrow.

* * *

 **Note:**

 **Extracurricular: "Are We Dancing?" from _The Happiest Millionaire_**


	19. Chapter 19

It's not a shout that wakes her up. Not a crash, a loud sound. It's a quiet sound. One that's not trying to make a fuss about itself. One that would like her attention, but not if it's going to take her away from other things. It's a sound that seems to imply "if you're not doing anything else" or "if you've got the spare time and have nothing else going on" in its tenor.

It sounds like this: "Natalia."

With a period. Not an exclamation point, demanding attention. Not a question mark, indicating uncertainty. Not an ellipsis, implying that there is something left unsaid.

"Natalia."

She uncurls. Finds she's been tucked under the sheets, her head eased onto a stack of three pillows. Then she pushes herself up. The sheets and bedclothes away from her body. Feet touch the floor. Her brain is slow in the way that tells her that she's been asleep for much longer than her body required. Joints stiff. She takes two staggering steps before the muscles resign themselves to the reality of moving again.

She sniffs hard through her nose. Notes that the room is not cold, how the Soldier likes it. The curtains aren't pulled firmly closed; light shimmers in meekly. There's the sound of the shower running. She continues in that direction; she has to make a stop there anyway.

As usual, when the Soldier takes a shower, the door is open and the lights are off. This wasn't so strange in Sweden where the main bathroom was on the second floor and had a large window in it. But it's strange again now that they're in a hotel.

"Yakov?" she says. Pauses just outside the door.

He makes a sound. A false start on another sentence. "In here."

"Did you need something?"

"Yes.

"What do you need?"

"Help, I think."

His modesty be damned, she crosses the threshold, flips the flights on, and approaches the shower. She blinks. What she sees is not what she expected. He's sitting on the floor, propped up against the wall. Water sprays his navel, turning the blood oozing from his wounds into skinny rivers of pink.

"What happened?" she says. Doesn't dare get closer.

He shrugs by looking at her. "Got dizzy. So I sat down. Can't get up."

"Been bleeding the whole time?"

"Can't remember."

"Head still hurt?"

"Hasn't stopped since I woke up in that aid station."

He calls the place Barton brought them to an aid station. She supposes, to him, it's not a lie. For her, it might be something else. (The picture of Barton's dog is now tucked in the Oh Shit Bag, nestled next to the one of her and the Soldier in Sweden.)

She reaches into the shower and notices immediately that the water is cold. Too cold.

"Idiot," she says without thought. "What were you thinking?" Heedless of getting her clothes wet, she adjusts the water temperature until it's something approaching lukewarm.

"The cold," he says. "Thought it might help me remember."

"Idiot," she says again. Lets the water run for a bit. Then reaches in, catches his eye, says, "You gotta help me out", and pulls him out of the shower.

They skid out onto the tile floor. She hides him in all the towels the bathroom has to offer. At least he helps by pulling them tight around his body. It's a shame the towels are white. Because of the stains. Natalia hesitates, thinks a lot about doing it — she reaches out a hand and runs it up and down the towel covering the Soldier's arm. Hopefully rubbing warmth back into him.

It's short-lived. She says, "I'm going to get the aid kit."

Natalia leaves him there.

Natalia comes back to him.

He looks up when she comes back. Looks back down.

"Cold?" she says.

He shakes his head.

"OK. Let me see."

He unravels above the hips.

They don't speak or look at each other's eyes as she cleans it up. It surprises her that he's not much improved, considering what she knows about him. His physiology. The wound on his arm dribbles the worst, surprisingly. The one in his leg he is resistant to let her tend to. Modest when he's awake. It makes her smile, but she demonstrates restraint. She wonders how important those injections that Petrenko told her about are. Natalia makes a point not to worry. Applies thick bandages that compress the body. He makes a noise when she secures them. It is not an encouraging noise. It's a bruise if a bruise made a noise.

She says, "Hey." Catches his face when his neck quits on the weight of his head.

"I don't know what's wrong," he says. He pushes his head out of her hands and onto her shoulder. Presses his forehead into her. Her hands reach for his shoulders, holding him upright. Holding him back.

His skin touches her skin.

Natalia slowly, slowly bends her neck until her lips touch the top of his head. She wants to tell him to be OK, but she doesn't ask this of him. He's trembling against her. He sets off earthquakes within the two of them. Natalia feels her eyes threaten to spill over. Her throat thickens.

She can make all of this go away for him, but she refuses to. For so long — but now she has him. She has a soldier to call her own. Someone to call friend. She has her Yasha.

 _You have a man in a cage_ , the spider in her says.

"Yasha," she whispers to his hair. "Yasha, I'm so sorry."

Because he's trying so _hard_ for her.

"Why did I know Steve Rogers? Who is he to me?" he asks her skin.

"I—I don't know, Yasha."

Agent Barton is wrong. She _is_ what they made her into. She doesn't want to be. Never wanted to be. What else can she be made into? What can _she_ make herself into?

"Will he remember who I was, when they wake him up? Will he look for me? Does he know I'm still here?"

More questions for her skin. It crawls. Wants to tell. She won't let it.

"Did I choose this?" He breaks his voice on her shoulder. His body heaves. "Did I want to be this?" The metal fist pounds weakly on the tile. "Did they take everything in my head, or did I give it away?"

Her hands let go of his shoulders. They wrap around his head. Holding it against her shoulder.

"No," she says. "No, you didn't ask for this."

His breath fogs up her skin so she can't see herself anymore. That's how she's always liked it.

"Then why didn't anyone ever look for me?"

One of the silken strands of her web snaps. It sounds like this: "Maybe they thought you had died. Maybe they couldn't find you."

"Maybe they found me, but I killed them."

She grips his hair. Hair that is brown. Hair that she cut herself. Hair that he wanted to style with Brylcreem.

"No," she says.

"Maybe I did something to deserve this," he says. "Maybe Steve Rogers sentenced me to this for a good reason."

In that moment, she learns that she can unmake herself. Natalia Romanova is not irredeemable. The web tears down the middle. It sounds like this: "Steve Rogers loves you."

The Soldier freezes against her. A man made ice again.

"Steve Rogers loves you," she repeats because he needs to hear it. It burns her throat to say. Tears off her spider's legs one by one. "Don't ever say that he wanted this for you."

Someone who is not the Soldier — not her Yasha — emerges from Natalia's shoulder. She lets him go even though it puts cracks in her. He leans back against the wall and looks at her. She looks at him. This is how he looks: Horrendously, irreparably homesick. Tired. Broken-eyed.

Lovely.

"Who are you?" she says.

"Asset."

"Who are you?"

" _Soldat_."

"Who are you?"

"Yakov."

"Who are you?"

"Your Yasha."

"Who am I?"

"Wha—you're Natalia."

" _Who are you_?"

"No one." But it's written on his face. His body knows who he is even if his mind doesn't. She watches him remember. It's slow and heavy on his tongue: "Once — he was always standing over me — when they would touch me, they called — he said . . . Sergeant Barnes."

She's dust.


	20. Chapter 20

It takes an hour, but she gets Sergeant Barnes up off the bathroom floor. Between the walls and her legless spider's body, Sergeant Barnes makes it to the bed. Sergeant Barnes can't hold back a groan when the bed catches him, cradles him.

"You're not getting better," she says because her mind won't stop thinking it.

"I'll be OK," Sergeant Barnes says. But his eyes are closed and he's fighting nausea, clear as day.

"You're not getting better," she whispers.

What are her options? Sergeant Barnes has put the first crack in the Soldier's egg; step one to self-awareness. There's still one more decision to be made. She's made her choice about the Soldier and Bucky Barnes. All that's left is to make a choice for herself. But she needs more intelligence.

She plans.

Natalia gets Sergeant Barnes out of the bloodstained towels. Now that he has part of his real name, he seems ashamed of his nakedness. He hides himself in the bed covers without assistance. The two of them do the food-and-water song and dance again. Natalia finds that Sergeant Barnes is marginally more difficult than the Soldier. How are they different already? How are they still very much the same?

"I'm going to see Rainer," she says later, when he's been consumed by the bed.

"You can't go alone," says Sergeant Barnes.

"You can't come with me like this."

He makes a pathetic face. Tries to sit up. Tries not to whine.

Natalia promises, "I'll be OK."

She turns away from him and dresses like the spider she has no right to call herself. It's easy. She does it fast. Natalia approaches Sergeant Barnes's bedside and holds out two gifts: the SIG-Sauer from the Oh Shit Bag and a com device.

"So you can hear me and everything around me. And so I can hear you," she says. Repeats, "I'll be OK."

There's not a chance for Sergeant Barnes to protest because she's gone from the room. Spiders can move fast, even, apparently, ones without legs. Might be that they'll grow back. She hopes so. It's dangerous to go around with her pieces missing. Unless it's been that way all along and she's never noticed until now.

Oskar Rainer is moderately easy to find. He hasn't moved much, but he's increased the security of his home. The itsy bitsy spider makes herself at home in his living room and waits for him to leave his office and find her. When he does, he tries to squash her. Everyone either tries to squash a spider, or they run away screaming.

Natalia dodges his shoe and sends an EMP his way. That's plenty of time to disarm him and calm everyone down.

"Hello, Mr. Rainer," she says. She is Klara again. So he'll recognize her. "Sorry to barge in on you like this. You wouldn't _believe_ the week I've had!"

"Wh-what d'you want from me?" he stutters. "Please, I've already apologized!" He's hiding two stubs on his hand. Gone are his ring and pinky fingers.

Huh.

"Who were you selling the intel to, Mr. Rainer? You see, I've been _dying_ to know. My old boss sent me _all the way_ out here from my home in Russia just to talk to you. He's a little unreasonable, my boss. But along the way I've really started to get into it. Who _are_ you sharing secrets with?" She doesn't Bite him, but she lets him feel her teeth.

"I-I've already told—"

"Tell me," she suggests. "I've spoken a bit with Agent Barton." Rainer's eyes do gymnastics. "But I want to hear it from you. Who were you selling the intel to?"

A new voice: "They're called S.H.I.E.L.D."

Natalia drops Rainer and spins toward the door. Bezukhov. She's been so stupid. Bezukhov lifts a handgun and fires once. Rainer is short two fingers and one life.

"Hello again, Natalia."

She straightens up and inclines her head. In her ear, she hears Sergeant Barnes's breath. She says, "I'm afraid we haven't met! My name's Klara."

"Cute," says Bezukhov. "You've missed our check-ins. Every single one, actually. We are quite worried, you understand. The way you've been acting" — he fakes a laugh — "one would think you're trying to _run away_."

Natalia cocks her head in mock confusion.

"Yes, it's very funny indeed. And to think you were trying to take the Asset with you! Now, that would just be plain silly."

Spiders crawl into the room behind Bezukhov. The ones that failed to graduate. The ones that still wear chains instead of collars with tracking devices. They click at her. Natalia stands her ground, but she comes to find that Klara's insecurity belongs to herself. The feeling of not belonging when she encounters a crowd: that is Natalia Romanova. She claims the feeling and makes it hers again. Klara collapses; her cloth body is empty and unsupported.

"What is S.H.I.E.L.D.?" Natalia asks.

"Oh, just some American security pipe dream," says Bezukhov. "We rather overestimated how much of a threat they were when we gave you the assignment."

"Really."

He smiles. "Really." Opens his hands and spreads his arms, as if he expects a hug. "Are you ready to be reasonable?"

She says, "I won't go back."

Bezukhov knows the weight of the statement. He knows the fight that would result. He is a smart man, this monster. He says, "You want to go like Yelena."

In her ear, Sergeant Barnes stops breathing.

"I want to go like Yelena," Natalia says.

He looks so disappointed. Inside her, a weak piece deforms. This man was something in the realm of a father to her. Not really, not even close. But he was something warped that taught her and paid her special attention. He could love her like a daughter. He _could —_

(This man used and abused her and called it education.)

"I can't just let you go," he says. "You have something that does not belong to you."

In her ear, Sergeant Barnes pants for breath. Then he goes silent.

"I won't," she says.

"We will take it by force if you do not surrender the Asset. His owners are quite upset with us. There will be a lot of damage if you keep him. Is his existence more important to you than the lives of one hundred of your sisters? That is what they threaten if you do not return their Asset."

She won't. Not to save herself. Not to save the spiderlings. She _won't_.

Bezukhov has known her since she was young. Since _he_ was young and handsome. He knows her. He knows her inside and out. She hadn't said no but _she hadn't said yes either._

He says, "I will give you eighteen hours to decide. And then things will become very bad for you and for us. Trust me when I tell you that you do not want to end up in their custody. You want to leave us so bad — you will find the Asset's handlers less kind than us at our most brutal."

Natalia leaves. No one follows. She walks around Cologne for three hours just to make sure. She's cold and her fingers are frozen. She meant to plan as she walked but her mind is frozen. She can be free like Yelena is free. And it's so easy to obtain that freedom. It's so difficult to obtain that freedom. It's impossible, but she can make it happen. Be free like Yelena — it is more than she could have hoped for even in the beginning, when she'd planned to fake her own death and send the Soldier back as witness.

But she hadn't been able to send her Yasha away then. She can't send Sergeant Barnes back to hell. Not now that he's almost found his name. Not when she knows this is mission failure for him. Not when she knows what mission failure means. What they'll do — but they won't kill him. No, they'd never be so kind.

Natalia arrives back at the hotel to find Sergeant Barnes sitting up in bed. He's trying to stand up and get to his clothes. She hurries to him. Her bare hands touch his bare chest. She pushes him back. He lets her. Or he can't fight her.

"What's wrong?" she says.

"I have to go back."

"That's insane." She's worried. Has his headache made him delirious? Should she call Agent Barton right now and get Sergeant Barnes back in a hospital? "You're not going back."

He looks at her. Looks in her eyes. His have never been more clear. She thinks they might actually be blue, not grey.

"Natalia," he says. "I have to go back." He pulls the com device out of his ear and holds it out to her.

The spider is trapped beneath a shoe that weighs as much as the world. She can't move. All of her is stuck.

"Please" is all she says. Closes her eyes to the reality, the inevitability.

His hands come up and hold her face. "You are Natalia," he whispers to her.

She doesn't cry.

"I'm not going to get better without those injections," he says. "I need to go back, or I'll die. If I stay, I'll die and so will you. So will all those girls. Natalia, don't put those lives on me."

She doesn't whimper. She says, "What they'll do to you—"

"They won't do anything I haven't already lived through."

She shakes her head. This is wrong. There are better options. There's Agent Barton and this S.H.I.E.L.D. They can come up with a better plan. "I'll call Barton, the guy from the aid station—"

"No, Natalia. I have to do this."

She doesn't become emotional. She reclaimed Natalia. She is not irredeemable.

"It's not forever," he says.

She opens her eyes and stares at him. This is Bucky Barnes from the pictures before the war. But there is no Steve Rogers around. There is only her. She's the one he's holding.

Her lips form the word "what" but she doesn't say it. (She finally understands why he used to do it.)

"You get your freedom," he says. He's strong and solid. He's holding _her_. "You go and figure out who Natalia is. After that — and _only_ after you do that — you go to Steve Rogers. You find out if he could still love something like me. And then you come find me. OK?"

She shakes her head, caught between his dissimilar hands. Eyes closed again. She's not a spider now. She leaks from the eyes. She's not strong. She's not like him.

"Natalia, you have to do this for me."

No. Shake her head. Dumb idea. Just the _thought_ of it . . .

"Please," he says. "This is what I want."

He has to see it. It's ridiculous. A knee-jerk reaction. They just need time to think. They're being stupid and emotional —

"You're Natalia and I'm Bucky," he says.

Eyes open and she stares. Frozen. Again, her lips trace the word "what".

"You're Natalia," he says. "And I'm Bucky Barnes."

She shakes her head. She has nothing. She will be nothing but homeless stuffing.

"You get your freedom," he says again. Like he's repeating from a list of instructions. "You go and figure out who you are and who you want to be. And only after you've done that do you go find Steve and figure out if he could still want Bucky Barnes around, even though he's soiled and broken. Then you come find me and bring me home."

Her lips echo the word "no" over and over. They both know what it means. Natalia's bones disintegrate and she falls into his chest. He catches her. Her spider's body crawls until it's cradled entirely on his lap, in his mismatched arms. Her head tucked safe beneath his jaw. A ghost has never been more solid.

Her skin touches his skin. She tastes his bare chest with every muted "no". She feels where he stops and begins again. Rivers never stop running until they dry up and so does she. Natalia pushes her face into his skin where shoulder becomes neck, wraps an arm around him like silk to hold herself there. She breathes in what is him.

All that she has. All that she's about to give up. Selfish, but it's what he wants. Shouldn't — so many other plans if only they took the time to think. No, this isn't what they're going to do. In a few hours, they'll be thinking clearer.

But when a few hours have passed, all that has happened is that he's laid down, still holding her to his skin. They breathe each other. They've done no thinking. He hasn't changed his mind. Hers won't work. Paralyzed by what she could have and what it costs and what it means that he is offering it in the first place.

After six hours, he kisses the crown of her head and doesn't say a word. So neither does she; just continues to mouth the word "no".

And then it's been twelve hours and they've still done no thinking. No planning. No calling in backup.

At hour fifteen, he insists. Waits for her to get off his chest. He sits up, slow and dying. She helps him dress, hating every motion that her arms make. He sits on the edge of the bed, breathing hard from sitting upright.

"You won't make it," she tries halfheartedly.

"The adrenaline will help," he says lowly. He is scared. He looks at her and pleads. Says, "You have to send the Winter Soldier back."

Then she cries.

"Don't — . . ." she says.

"Natalia. Please. Send back the Winter Soldier."

She injects him with a second syringe of epinephrine from the Oh Shit Bag. And then, through breath that her lungs can't catch, she begins: "Longing . . ."

And when she's through, Sergeant Barnes is gone and the Soldier is back and he tells her that he's ready to comply. She can hardly see through the rivers. She steps up to him. Holds his face in her hands. She kisses the top of his head. His forehead. His nose. Both his cheeks. But not his lips. Never his lips.

"Don't do anything stupid until I come back for you," she whispers to him. She's rot and poison, and this is what it is to be free.

The Soldier looks strangely at her and says, "How can I? You're taking all the stupid with you."

Underwater again, she smiles. "Go home, _Soldat_."

He stands. She drops her hands away but he catches her face with his own hands. Says, "Боюсь, что мне пора."

And then it's just Natalia and awful reality.

She crawls into the bed. It's still warm. She spins a web around herself, tying her body to this bed. She sleeps, hoping to wake to something better. A place where this didn't really happen. Because there were so many other ways this could have been resolved. Better ways. Obvious solutions where one of them didn't have to be so stupid and the other selfish. But when she wakes, nothing's changed. The Soldier's still gone and so is Sergeant Barnes, Bucky Barnes, Yakov.

Her Yasha is still gone.

She lies in her web and she denies that it's happening. She lies there so long that she begins to doubt that she can get up. Then she remembers her promise, and even though it seems futile and empty of meaning, she drags the Oh Shit Bag from the floor into her web. She dumps it out. Guns and a pair of photographs stare back at her. She picks up the one of the dog. Turns it over.

She presses the numbers of the second of the three listed numbers. Dials them into the phone on which she loaded pirated music for her Yasha. The phone rings plainly.

And then: "This is Barton."

Natalia finally admits it. "I need help."

* * *

 **Note:**

 **Cue "My Way" by Frank Sinatra.**

 **Roll credits. LOL just kidding (sort of). One more chapter to come. The "second act" will be a separate/new work about — you guessed it — Nat and Steve.**

 **Боюсь, что мне пора = I'm afraid that I have to go**


	21. Postscript

The door opens two days later and Barton enters. He's moving fast, like he's worried. But he's moving too slow; casual.

"Natasha?" he calls into the darkened suite once he's entered. She can hear it in his voice: he thinks it's a trap.

He says (one of her) name(s) again. The door falls closed; she hears it. Barton opens other doors and calls for Natasha. Then he opens the door to the bedroom and finds her in her web.

"Jesus," he says. He comes to her side. "Are you alright?"

She shakes her head.

"Here. C'mon. Let's get you out of here."

He doesn't ask what happened. Doesn't demand to know what's going on, what led to this moment. Agent Clint Barton pulls a girl out of a spider web. He takes her on his raft of safety. But it doesn't matter. All the water's gone now.

—

"This isn't what we meant when we gave you the assignment," Maria Hill says.

Natalia finally gets to meet the boss she'd been so concerned about. Barton stands beside Natalia; they face off with Hill. The woman is so young that it's almost comical. She is definitely someone's protégée. Natalia likes Hill immediately, even the razor-sharp severity she wears about herself as armor.

"I think this is better than what you asked me to do," Barton says.

Three hours later, it's been settled. Barton vouches for her. Natalia is now in his custody while they get proper paperwork for her. While they figure out what to do with a spider when they wanted a dead girl.

—

It's the sixth hour of her interrogation. _They_ call it a debriefing. Barton was right — these people are dicks.

"I'm not going to say anything about the Red Room," Natalia says. "It's one of the conditions of my release."

"Then _break_ those conditions," the black man says. He was the one at Haxenhaus. Now the man wears an eyepatch. She can't stop looking at it. She's like a child.

She shakes her head at the futility of the conversation.

The black man sighs and softens. It's a tactic that Natalia has used herself. Useful for manipulating situations. He says, "Look, if you're worried about them coming after you—"

She cuts him off, "I'm not worried they'll come after me."

"Then what is it? Your loyalties get left behind in Moscow?" The eyepatch is combative again.

Her loyalties didn't get left behind. They were sent away. She goes dark on the eyepatch. Fuck him.

He calms down again. Tries to go back to being nice. "We can protect you from them. You honestly believe that they just let you walk away?"

She leans forward. "I don't know how you Americans do it, but where I come from, even liars and cheats have a code. I won't talk about the Red Room, and they won't come after me."

"Then what good are you?"

She doesn't know.

—

It's February by the time they let her out of their compound. She moves in with Barton (because she has to) in New York City. Really, it's a seventeen-mile move (gotta get used to using these godawful Imperial units). Natalia doesn't think for a second that the apartment isn't stuffed to bursting with bugs and surveillance equipment. Her first day is spent disabling or interrupting their signals. Just so this S.H.I.E.L.D. knows she can do it. So they know she knows.

It's lonely here. Barton is away a lot. Natalia likes the loneliness. It's easy to spin a web around herself and dissolve. She doesn't cry and sob. She just cocoons in blankets and melts into puddles of static. Sleep is torture viewed through red lenses. Sometimes this goes on for days. Natalia would never get out that cocoon — she'd let herself starve — if it wasn't for Barton's dog. Lucky is left in her care when Barton is away. She has to leave the web to feed the dog and take it out. When they're inside and her head's gone back to Russia, Lucky lies at her feet and chews on things he's not supposed to.

—

Word comes down: She has an assignment and a title. No longer is she Natalia Romanova, Red Room defector. Now, she is Natasha Romanoff — it's what the papers say — probationary agent of S.H.I.E.L.D. with restricted allowances.

No leaving the country.

No leaving the state unaccompanied.

No missions may appropriate S.H.I.E.L.D. property without written consent.

No driver's license may be issued to her under any of her names.

No living unsupervised. Check-in with custodian nightly.

No ducking calls; check-ins are three times a week, unscheduled. So she better be ready any time they decide to call.

No calls or other communication may be made on non-S.H.I.E.L.D. devices. (Not even trying to hide the fact that they're watching her every move.)

No use of weapons that are not issued directly to her by a superior and qualified S.H.I.E.L.D. agent or officer.

The assignment packet reminds her at the end, in bold letters, NO SELF-APPOINTED MISSIONS — MAY ONLY PARTICIPATE IN MISSIONS ISSUED BY A SUPERIOR AND QUALIFIED S.H.I.E.L.D. AGENT OR OFFICER.

For her very first mission, they've assigned her to "surveillance/security detail" for one Capt. Steven G. Rogers. Apparently Captain America hasn't been taking well to twenty-first century New York. Natasha must present herself as a friend, ease him back into the world, and fend off any threats — because the revival of an icon is sure to bring out the crazies (Barton's words).

How convenient the assignment is — it was what she was going to do anyway. She might not even have to break any of their rules for the time being (later though, she's pretty sure she's going to be breaking every one of those rules and then some). After all, finding Steve Rogers is only half of her promise.

—

She practices her opening move with Lucky. He really is a great dog.

—

Steve Rogers seems to only move at night. When there are fewer people and less noise. She follows him and watches him haunt this city he no longer recognizes. After five days, she stands where she can see him and lets Lucky's leash slip through her fingers. The dog takes off running as planned.

"Oh no," Natalia says. Jogs after the dog. Rolls her ankle in an imaginary hole in the ground, a made-up crack in the pavement. (Maybe she's not pretending at all.)

Steve Rogers runs so fast that Natalia's hair flutters in her face when he goes by. She sits in the dirty snow and holds her ankle. He comes back to where she sits with Lucky. The dog trots happily beside him, tongue lolling.

"Are you alright?" he says.

The photos didn't do him justice. Natalia's stunned by the sheer size of him. In the night, he seems apart.

"Yeah," she says. "Just having the worst night of my life."

He looks uncomfortable now. He doesn't know what to say next. Natalia spares him and gets up. Staggers for dramatic effect. Her ankle! Is it broken? Is it sprained? Rogers puts an arm out and steadies her. Lucky watches them with his one eye, all drool and smiles.

"Hey," he says, "take it easy. I could, uh — I could walk you home. Y-you know, if you'd like. It's late."

"Would you?" she says. "I've only been here a few weeks. Always afraid I'll get lost. But my custodian's dog — and, well, here we are." She feels like Klara.

"Where're you from? Originally," he says.

"Russia."

"No kidding?"

"None."

"What made you decide to up and move?"

"Uh. Personal reasons. Work."

They make slow progress down the walk.

"Mind if I ask what your line of work is?"

"I have a very specific skill set," she says.

"Heard that before," he says.

It makes her laugh. So she repays him with the truth. "I defected from a, well I guess the best way to describe it is to call it a spy school."

He seems surprised. "S.H.I.E.L.D.?"

"How'd you know?"

It's annoying to feign a limp for seven blocks. Steve Rogers keeps one hand on Lucky's leash. His other arm is around Natalia, supporting her when her completely healthy ankle gives out. All she can think about is how both of Steve Rogers's arms are made of flesh and bone. No cool metal to offer relief from life. They trade minimally-revealing facts about each other along the way. At the door to Barton's apartment, Natalia thanks him.

Rogers says, "Hey, I didn't get your name."

She holds Lucky's leash with two hands. "Oh. I'm Natasha."

"Steve," he says and offers his hand.

She shakes it, feeling silly. Goes back to holding the leash tight. "Maybe I'll see you around," she says.

"Yeah. Yeah, maybe," he says. "Good night, Natasha."

"Good night, Steve."

It's a start.

* * *

 **Note:**

 **TBC in a new story. Hope I see you there!**

 **Thanks for reading! Drop me a line; I'd like that.**


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